Biz/ed, the premier website for business education, has been acquired by Thomson Learning under an exclusive agreement with the University of Bristol and HEFCE (Higher Education Funding Council for England).
Under the agreement, Thomson will acquire all assets and intellectual property rights for Biz/ed, a comprehensive online learning service for students, teachers and lecturers of business, economics, accounting, leisure and recreation and travel and tourism.
Biz/ed regularly features as one of the top sites for business education listed by popular web search engines. Many students, teachers and lecturers have already discovered that Biz/ed holds a wealth of teaching and learning resources – all presented in a lively and approachable way.
Since its launch in 1996, Biz/ed has established itself as the primary provider of internet based learning materials, and now receives over 3 million page accesses a month. Originally based at the Institute for Learning and Research Technology (ILRT) at the University of Bristol and funded by JISC (Joint Information Systems Committee), the sale of Biz/ed to Thomson Learning EMEA will ensure the ongoing success of the popular service.
Ray Crispin, Business Support Manager at the University’s technology transfer team said, “We are very excited about the coming together of Biz/ed and Thomson Learning EMEA. We are confident that this deal has secured the future of a very successful project.”
Thomson Learning EMEA is the leading provider of learning solutions to higher and further education and corporate training markets in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Under the deal, Thomson Learning EMEA will be able to develop an electronic platform for the delivery of new educational content, resources and programs to students, professors and institutions throughout the world.
Greg Browne, CEO, International Group for Thomson Learning commented, “Bringing Biz/ed into the Thomson family will help Thomson Learning further develop its higher education and library reference services and provide us with access to new customers and new sources of revenue.” He added, “More importantly, Biz/ed gives us another way of ensuring our customers are given the broadest range of choice in learning resources and content delivery.”
Thomson Learning EMEA is planning to continue to offer Biz/ed as a free service and generate revenue through on-site advertising. In the future, Thomson Learning EMEA will explore the possibility of extending the Biz/ed platform to customers in other subjects such as health, social care and law.
Andrew Ashwin, content developer for Biz/ed said, “We are very pleased to be joining the Thomson Corporation. Thomson Learning EMEA’s quality content, complementary markets and offerings combined with Thomson’s financial resources will help us better service the thousands of business and economics students and instructors who visit our site every day.”
CEO of JISC Collections, Lorraine Estelle said, “JISC has invested in Biz/ed and supported its development for many years. It has grown to become a key resource in its subject areas and we are delighted that the core resource will remain open access and sustainable into the future.”