Lepaya, a provider of soft skills training courses has raised €5 million from media group Mediahuis. This funding will enable the Amsterdam-based startup to accelerate the implementation of its projected growth plans. At the same time, this investment will allow Lepaya to further develop its range of training courses and the underlying technology. On the other hand, Mediahuis is taking another step in its diversification strategy.
René Janssen, Managing Director and co-founder of Lepaya: “In the business community, soft skills will make the difference in the years ahead. Today, many businesses are also looking for a partner that can help them to educate employees. Over the past period, we have seen an increase in the influx of customers looking for a high-impact approach, especially now that many businesses need to accelerate the re-skilling of their staff due to the current economic situation. Mediahuis’ injection of capital provides us with the opportunity to grow both geographically and in terms of our range of products and services.”
Gaining international acclaim!
In the past two years, the Dutch edtech startup has seen rapid growth. Notably, the development of personal skills such as powerful communication, coaching management, coping with stress or effectively managing a team, has also dramatically increased in importance. The company’s blended training program – online and classroom training sessions in soft skills is gaining international acclaim.
Peter Kuperus, Managing Director and co-founder adds: “At the same time, we also want to take big steps technologically towards making the learning experience more personal based on data and thus be more relevant for an individual employee. The great thing about this partnership is that Lepaya and Mediahuis very clearly share the same long-term vision. Particularly in terms of offering personalised content, we can learn a lot from each other. Our organisations share the same DNA and that makes us very positive about the future.”
Need for training courses!
Lepaya was established at the start of 2018 by René Janssen and Peter Kuperus, who, based on their experiences both in the corporate world and the scale-up scene, saw that there is a need for training courses that sustainably change behaviour. The startup mainly operates in the Netherlands, but services its customer base worldwide, including in the USA, Germany, and Spain.
Why Mediahuis invested?
The investment planned by Mediahuis signifies a new step in the European media group’s diversification strategy. Alongside its core news activities, this strategy consists of focusing on new growth markets and business models, thus broadening the development potential of the Group. Following its earlier introduction into the media technology market with its investment in the US-based Mather Economics at the end of 2019, this represents for Mediahuis its first investment in the education technology market.
Gert Ysebaert, CEO of Mediahuis Group: “The training market not only offers attractive prospects and opportunities for growth, it also fits in with Mediahuis’ mission, particularly providing information independently, thereby making a positive contribution to society. Specifically in terms of soft skills, today we can only see their importance increasing. Particularly in times when physical contact between staff is decreasing sharply, these social skills and developing them are becoming ever more important. We believe in Lepaya’s approach, in which online and classroom training courses are combined through the smart use of data. Lepaya is focussing closely on the impact of training courses leading to results. Consequently, we also believe in existing expertise and the potential for continued growth.”
Main image credits: Lepaya
