German software giant SAP announced it will sell its Litmos training platform to US private equity firm Francisco Partners, with the deal expected to finalize in Q4 2022. The company didn’t disclose the acquisition amount.
The move comes as SAP’s other workforce development and optimization solution, SAP SuccessFactors, lands industry awards from the likes of Gartner and has grown to serve over 12,000 companies.
“As a result of SAP’s ongoing company-wide portfolio review, we determined that the value propositions and functionalities of the SAP SuccessFactors Learning solution and SAP Litmos solutions overlap,” said Meg Bear, President and Chief Product Officer at SAP SuccessFactors, announcing the sale.
We are confident that the best opportunity for Litmos to provide growth and innovation for its customers, employees and business is to operate as a stand-alone company.
“Francisco Partners will be able to provide Litmos the necessary investment, focus and experience to continue to realize its ongoing growth.”
Litmos is one of the world’s leading solutions for workforce learning management, and is used by companies such as Sabre and Celigo to train both employees and customers.
They use Litmos to create training courses to onboard customers quickly while minimizing customer service queries.
The company claims that training customers reduces calls to customer service, which allows companies to save at least $4 per query, citing a PwC report.
The learning management systems (LMS) industry is projected to grow from $16 billion in 2022 to $40 billion by 2029, according to Fortune Business Insights. Adobe, Oracle, and Taleo all have a presence in the space.
Francisco Partners has invested in several education companies in the past, including Civitas Learning, Discovery Education, and ExLibris. It has also invested in workforce management companies like Zenefits.
While SAP didn’t disclose the terms of the acquisition, Reuters last reported in May that it considered Litmos to be worth more than $1 billion.
