DreamBox this morning announced that it has been acquired by a new partnership between Netflix CEO Reed Hastings and the Charter Fund, a non-profit venture capital firm. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed, although we know the agreement includes a $10 million R&D investment and newly appointed board members.
Dreambox Learning was backed by $7.1 million in funding from angel investors. The funds will be used to develop new e-Learning content across a variety of disciplines, as well as technology enhancements to the DreamBox Learning Platform.
Hastings in a comment said:
“I have evaluated many companies in the K-12 e-Learning marketplace and DreamBox Learning clearly stood out. They have already shown strong results in a short period of time, and the DreamBox Learning Platform has the best underlying adaptive technology, giving every student the opportunity to thrive through innovative online learning. My end goal of bringing DreamBox Learning and The Charter Fund together is to fuel the movement of e-Learning and help millions of students.”
Since the company’s launch in April 2008, DreamBox Learning has released a series of online math products for the school and home environments, targeting young students in kindergarten through third grade.
Its core product assesses each student’s mathematical understanding on an ongoing basis, providing the most suitable hints and encouragement at the right pace for that child, and offers the next personally appropriate activities as subsequent choices.
This sounds similar to Knewton and its adaptive learning platform (the company just announced $12.5 million in fresh funding yesterday), although that company focuses on an older demographic.
Reed Hastings will serve as DreamBox Learning Chairman of the Board, while his executive role at Netflix will remain unchanged. The newly appointed members of DreamBox’s Board of Directors are Kevin Hall, CEO and President of Charter School Growth Fund and John Danner, Co-Founder and CEO of Rocketship Education (and former CEO of the public firm NetGravity).