North Media Online A/S invests in Lix Technologies ApSNorth Media Online A/S invests a total of DKK 18 million in Lix Technologies ApS and acquires a 20% stake in the company. This capital and North Media Online A/S' co-ownership are to help Lix realise the ambitious plans of creating the platform of the future for digital learning and textbooks.
30 June 2016
Company announcement no 08-16
Today, North Media Online A/S (”North Media Online”) has entered into an agreement to invest DKK 18 million in Lix Technologies ApS ("Lix"). With this investment, North Media Online will obtain a 20% stake in Lix, which has been founded by entrepreneurs Camilla Hessellund Lastein and Kasper Enggaard Krog. The company has a platform for textbooks on which students have access to more than 100,000 books via www.lix.com. It is possible to buy the books at prices that are lower than through the usual channels, and students may use the platform to take and share notes as well as to avail themselves of a series of other digital learning tools. Today, Lix has 13 employees and is headquartered in Aarhus.
The capital invested by North Media Online is to lift Lix to a position of being a strong, global player in the rapidly growing digital textbook market and being tomorrow's learning platform for students.
The investment in Lix reflects North Media Online’s high digital level of ambition
North Media Online's strategic focus is to increase the digital element of its business and add to its portfolio by investing in more digital solutions. Chief Executive Officer of North Media Online, Henrik Løvig, has for some time been in dialogue with Lix, which he considers one of the most promising Danish tech businesses.
”Lix is a most exciting investment opportunity for North Media Online. With Lix, we enter the field of digital learning and textbooks which is a very large and heavily growing market. The number of students attending further education is increasing rapidly and, globally, it is expected to reach 250 million by 2025. Lix has a strong team, and by combining this with our supplementary competencies and active ownership, we have a shared ambition to scale Lix and so become leaders in the international scene,” says Henrik Løvig and continues:
”Lix has built and launched a fantastic digital platform and already has contracts with many Danish and international publishers. After a successful test period in spring 2016, Lix is to be rolled out after the school summer holidays to around 30,000 students at Denmark’s upper secondary schools, and Lix will also be offered to students at further education institutions in both Denmark and abroad. In this country, a selected group of students has been using the Lix platform since spring 2016 to read their text books in digital form and to take notes and to generally optimise their learning. Lix is well underway to make the same solutions available to students all over the world."
Lix sees North Media Online as a perfect partner
The 23-year-old co-founder of Lix, Camilla Hessellund Lastein, is happy that it was North Media Online, which ended up investing in Lix: “Lix and North Media Online are a perfect match. We will now have an investor who has profound digital space knowledge as well as the competencies needed for the ambitious growth strategy we have defined.”
Kasper Enggaard Krog, co-founder of Lix, adds: ”To Lix, this investment is an important step in our aspiration of becoming a global player. We already have contracts with more than 300 Danish and international publishers, and now Lix is set to reach students in many more markets besides the Danish market."
Unchanged earnings expectations for the financial year 2016
The investment in Lix will not affect North Media Online’s expected EBIT before special items in 2016 which will remain unchanged between a negative DKK 5 million and DKK 0 million. Profit or loss from Lix will be recognised in profit or loss from associates, and the share of profit or loss from Lix is expected to affect profit or loss from associates by a negative DKK 2 million in 2016.
For further information, please contact Henrik Løvig, Chief Executive Officer of North Media Online A/S, at +45 61 79 94 31.
Yours faithfully
North Media A/S
Kåre Wigh
Group Executive Director & CFO
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