Acquisition Enhances LRN’s Position as the Leading Global Provider of Ethics and Compliance Solutions
Combined Organization Will Help More Companies Build Effective Compliance Programs and Create Ethically Aware and Inspired Workforces
NEW YORK (September 9, 2020) – Ethics and compliance education and technology company LRN Corporation announced today the acquisition of Interactive Services, the Dublin, Ireland-based global compliance and online learning firm. The combined organization will help more companies build and implement effective compliance programs and foster values-based and ethical cultures and workforces at a time when those imperatives are more urgent than ever.
As part of a significant investment in LRN in 2018 by Leeds Equity Partners, LRN and Leeds committed to expanding the company’s reach and scale to advance their shared objective to help more companies elevate behavior, reduce risks and create sustainable competitive advantages. The Interactive Services transaction represents a strategic combination that accelerates the combined company’s investments in people, innovation and technology.
Together, LRN and Interactive Services will be positioned to provide even greater ethics and compliance offerings across education, technology, advisory services and analytics to further enable companies to navigate the complex legal, compliance, regulatory and operating environments across the globe.
“We are in a time of increasing focus and scrutiny on corporate and individual conduct, accelerated by the global pandemic and an intensifying awareness of societal inequalities,” said Dov Seidman, LRN Founder and Chairman. “In response, companies throughout the world are urgently re-imagining the workplace, redefining leadership and seeking to build cultures that are genuinely aligned and inclusive. This, in turn, requires meaningful education, communication, codes of conduct, adaptive learning environments and other tools that inspire employees, put ethics and compliance at the heart of corporate operations and guide the right kind of principled and profitable behavior – from front-line employees and managers to the C-suite and boards of directors. As expectations of companies and their leaders rise from society and employees alike, the winners will be those who most effectively operationalize the understanding that values drive behavior and behavior drives performance,” added Seidman.
The combination of LRN with Interactive Services enriches LRN’s offerings by expanding its vast SaaS-based education and technology platform, which includes hundreds of courses and educational products and provides LRN with additional delivery and analytics capabilities to improve employee learning and ensure corporate compliance. The transaction further extends LRN’s presence outside of North America and broadens its custom content capabilities in ethics and compliance and many other corporate functions.
“LRN has for more than 25 years helped define and shape the ethics and compliance space. Given Interactive’s long commitment to improving talent and performance in the workplace through creative design, we are extremely excited to be joining LRN, to embrace LRN’s mission of inspiring principled performance and to add to LRN’s deep array of offerings – and we believe the business world, and society, will be the better for it,” said Matt Plass, CEO of Interactive Services.
Jeffrey T. Leeds, Managing Partner at Leeds Equity, said, “Strong leaders recognize that compliance with rules and regulations is about far more than ‘checking the box.’ An authentic commitment to the highest standards in ethics and compliance not only reduces risk – which can increasingly be catastrophic – but also creates a better workplace, which leads, in turn, to better work. With this acquisition of Interactive Services, LRN enhances its stature as the leading provider of the most effective ethics and compliance education and learning resources for companies throughout the world.”
About LRN Corporation
LRN’s mission is to inspire principled performance. Since 1994, LRN has helped over 25 million people at more than 700 companies worldwide simultaneously navigate complex legal and regulatory environments and make ethical decisions, and it has also helped hundreds of companies foster ethical, responsible and inclusive cultures. LRN’s combination of practical tools, education and strategic advice helps companies translate their values into concrete corporate practices and leadership behaviors that create sustainable competitive advantage. In partnership with LRN, companies need not choose between living principles and maximizing profits or between enhancing reputation and growing revenue: All are a product of principled performance. As a global company, LRN works with organizations in more than 100 countries.
For additional information on LRN, visit www.LRN.com
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About Leeds Equity Partners
Leeds Equity Partners, LLC, is a New York-based private equity firm dedicated exclusively to partnering with management teams in the education, training and information services industries. The firm was founded in 1993 and currently manages $2.5 billion of capital across a broad spectrum of companies within the knowledge industries. Leeds Equity seeks to leverage its sector-focused expertise and market insights to create long-term value for its portfolio companies.
About Interactive Services
Interactive Services, based in Dublin, Ireland, has been inspiring organizations to act with integrity for over 25 years, providing award-winning learning solutions to some of the biggest brands in the world. Alongside the fastest growing E&C content library solution in the marketplace, Interactive Services also offers creative custom online and person-to-person learning design, delivering over 300 unique projects to clients in 40+ countries, reaching more than 3 million learners every year.
