FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
VANCOUVER, BC — AUGUST 4, 2017— Riipen, a Learning and Talent Management company based in Vancouver Canada, today announced that it has acquired Prollster, developed by Vancouver-based Proll IT Services. The Prollster software assesses the soft skills of people collaborating in online forums and was developed through testing on educational technology platforms at top educational institutions (Harvard edX, Stanford and University of California). The software is a perfect complement to Riipen’s experiential learning platform which allows students to develop and demonstrate their skills to potential employers, in conjunction with their academic studies. The combination of Riipen’s existing platform capability, and Prollster’s software, gives Riipen an end-to-end experiential learning and skills assessment platform that meets the needs of students, industry partners and educators alike.
"The Prollster team is world class, and is passionate about the same things we are, namely creating opportunities for students to develop and demonstrate their skills, and to finding the opportunities best suited to those skills," stated Mohamed Mansour, Executive Chairman of Riipen. "By combining the teams, and in particular adding Dr. Karen Bakker to our executive team, we deepen our ability to bridge HRTech and EdTech through enhancing student engagement. This accelerates our ability to change the face of talent acquisition for companies, and ultimately to reduce youth underemployment."
"Riipen is the perfect fit for us, both as individuals and as a software platform. We are united by a common culture based on a passion for improving the student experience, and social impact for underserved students, and our software neatly complements the RIipen platform. We had opportunities to partner our software with bigger and more well-established names in the technology industry, but Riipen was unique in its focus on skills-based experiential learning opportunities which we believe is the future of Learning and Talent Management," said Dr. Karen Bakker, co-founder and CEO of Prollster.
"The education industry is moving towards an experiential education model, in which “real world” projects are increasingly at the core of curriculum. Educators are increasingly interested in (and required to) demonstrate student engagement with off-campus partners,” said Mr. Mansour. “This creates an unprecedented opportunity for companies of all sizes to engage with students before they graduate. Companies benefit through gaining millennial insights and brand exposure, as well as deepening and diversifying their talent funnel. By using Prollster’s technology to enhance student engagement, Riipen will enhance the data and industry-vetted skills features of our platform, deepening our value proposition for both students and employers,” he added.
For further information, contact: Mohamed Mansour, Executive Chairman at mohamed.mansour@riipen.com
About Riipen
Riipen is an early stage Learning and Talent Management technology company with a mission to eliminate graduate underemployment. The company was founded in 2014 and has offices in Vancouver; Toronto; Los Angeles; and New York; with a fifth office to open in late 2017 in Australia.
In 2017, Riipen will work with well over 2,000 industry partners and 150 higher education institutions, to provide more than 20,000 students experiential learning opportunities with industry partners (a ten-fold increase on 2016). The company closed a $1.8M seed round in mid-2017, and will be raising a Series A in 2018. Riipen’s cloud-based platform connects students, educators, and employers through real-world projects (known as “experiential education” or “experiences”). Once connected to an employer, students completed projects (such as in-class assignments) and competitions (such as case competitions and hack-a-thons). Students expand their networks, gain a new online profile to showcase their industry-validated skills and experience, and build confidence and career clarity. Schools gain the ability to track and assess how students’ skills measure up in the real world, thereby setting their students up for success after graduation. Employers and organizations use Riipen to deepen and diversify their talent funnel in a “build your farm team” approach that is the future of Talent Management, and all Industry partners benefit through the authentic brand engagement with Millennials.
About Prollster
Prollster is an early stage tech company that bridges HRTech and EdTech and was founded in Vancouver in 2015. Their social learning technology is available on a stand-alone basis or as a plug-in to all major Learning Management Systems. The company launched in 2014, has users in 40+ countries, and is available in English and Spanish.
Certain statements in this press release including, but not limited to, statements as to: the anticipated benefits of the acquisition of Proll IT Services; the anticipated closing of the acquisition; the future of the computer industry; and the benefits, capabilities and performance of Riipen and Proll IT Services’ technology are forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Reform Act of 1995 that are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause results to be materially different than expectations. Such risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to, the risk that we will not realize the anticipated benefits of this acquisition, the risk that we may not be able to complete the acquisition, risks associated with acquisitions including the ability to successfully integrate technologies, employees and operations, diversion of management's attention, risks associated with international operations, industry trends, the impact of competitive products and technological advances, reliance third parties to manufacture, assemble, package and test our products, market acceptance of new products and technologies and other risks detailed from time to time in the reports Riipen files. These forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and speak only as of the date hereof, and, except as required by law, Riipen disclaims any obligation to update these forward-looking statements to reflect future events or circumstances.
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