Bangalore-based online-offline higher education services provider iNurture Education Solutions has raised Rs 30 crore investment from Bertelsmann India Investments (BII), the Indian investment arm of the German media conglomerate Bertelsmann. The company had previously raised undisclosed amount of investment from Ascent Capital in 2012 and GVFL in 2009.
Setup in 2004, iNurture partners various colleges & universities to offer industry relevant courses across various sectors like Information technology, animation, creative management, graphic design, mobile applications, business analytics and financial services among others. It currently offers diploma, undergraduate, post graduate, integrated and vocational training courses.
iNurture claims to currently have partnerships with more than twenty institutions across India to offer 25 different courses. This includes Jain University, Gujarat University, Poornima University, VELS University and Fergusson College among others and colleges like Thakur College of Science and Commerce, Carlton Business School and Horizon College of Business and Technology among others.
iNurture essentially ties-up with these universities & colleges as a ‘knowledge partner’, to replace the latter’s curriculum with its own curriculum and conduct on-campus classes for students. It also provides an online learning management system for them. On completion of the course, students are awarded university degree certificates from the respective educational institution. The company claims that it updates its curriculum every year, based on the industry requirements.
Bertelsmann’s education investments
Note that Bertelsmann & Kaizen had also invested Rs 22 crore into Authorgen Technologies that operates the online education platform WizIQ in January last year. WizIQ had introduced live classrooms on iOS and Android in December last year.
Interestingly, Bertelsmann had also invested an undisclosed amount in the US-based online education provider Udacity last month and had acquired US-based online learning solutions provider Relias Learning last week to foray into e-learning segment.
Bertelsmann in India
Besides iNurture & Authorgen, BII has made couple direct investments in India. This includes online furniture and home decor marketplace Pepperfry.com that raised $15 million from BII and Norwest Venture partners in May this year and online real estate portal IndiaProperty that raised $12 million from BII, Canaan Partners and Mayfield Fund in December last year.
In June this year, Bertelsmann had also invested a ‘multi-million-dollar amount’ in the India-focused investment agency Digital Nirvana Fund, that focuses on investments in early-stage digital startups in the digital sector and is managed by the Indian venture capital Nirvana Venture Advisors.
