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Blackboard has just announced that it is buying ANGEL Learning Systems. This is a huge move in the learning management market. ANGEL has been snatching up Blackboard’s costumer’s, especially in the community college market, left and right. Now, ANGEL customers will be forced into the Blackboard product line with the release of Blackboard NG. Blackboard
ANGEL is a private company and was purchased for 95 million dollars. The deal is expected to close this month. Blackboard is also involved in an ongoing legal brawl with one of the other main players in the LMS market, Desire 2 Learn. If Desire 2 Learn were to crumble under Blackboards legal pressure it would leave the open source product, Moodle as one of the only strong options outside of Blackboard.
The anti-trust problems of Microsoft come to mind when I look at this shift in the LMS market. With a community based LMS possibly being the only competition left for blackboard, could the feds get involved? Unfortunately for consumers, this means fewer options in the LMS market and most likely less innovation.
I must take a moment to express my distaste for this merger. I believe that competition fuels inovation and it frustrates me to see Blackboard taking such an aggressive tone in buying or suing other companies. Just think if blackboard used the 95 million dollars that they spent on ANGEL to improve their own product. If that were the case we could see some really compelling products. At the same time I am disappointed that ANGEL has decided to sell their company to Blackboard. ANGEL ,and it’s user base, has always prided itself on being agile and innovative, something that is about as far from Blackboard as anything. From my perspective ANGEL has lost sight of it’s users and joined ranks of the “Big Corporations.”
One outcome that is possible from all of this, is the death of what we think of as an LMS. Many people have been pointing to this for some time and the lack of options in the LMS world might be one major factor in bringing that to fruition. This combined with that fact that educators are getting more and more comfortable with using technology, we may see more and more mashups of different tools to create an LMS instead of a monolithic system.
Another possibility is that another major company will step in with a new product. For example google could expand their apps for education to include LMS like functionality, or Apple could expand ItunesU to a complete LMS.
Whatever the case, those who watch the LMS market should be in for a wild ride in the next few months and years.
This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 6th, 2009, 8:24 pm and is filed under News and Commentary.
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Thanks for the post. Couldn't agree more with your thoughts on the need for healthy competition to stimulate innovation and better customer service. My team and I (www.scholar360.com) were baffled by this news. We've been competing with Bb and Angel for years, so to have them acquired by Bb was very surprising. There are a handful of other LMS vendors out there that this bodes well for, but it is also a clear plus for Moodle and Sakai as well.
BDean
I fully agree with your reflections in the last couple of paragraphs. We live in a convergence culture and the mashup thoughts are "spot on." In fact, some from the early days of e-learning might recall the fact that many of us ran e-learning programs without an LMS. We just pulled together the best of individual products in order to produce a custom product that fits the individual needs of our school/program. This recent news is definitely challenging me to more deeply consider "Life after the LMS."
Travis
Yes, the mashups may be the saving grace. I also considered this in our program's early days and in fact started building the wrappers. Whatever you do though, don't use role based authentication, else you may feel Bborg stalking your institution.
What do you think the alternative to role based authentication? Is there another way to structure things that you have found that would get around the bb patents?
Travis
I have been managing my school's LMS since we started. WebCT was still a free product. Just yesterday, I was on top of the world in a career sense, despite looming budget cuts, furloughs etc. Here I am getting ready to present at AUC and share some of my knowledge with others in the community, someone from Angel marketing just contacted me about being interviewed for a marketing piece. WTH I thought, 'If everything here goes bad, I know this system pretty well. Hmm, maybe I could get a job with them or at least put myself out to the community. maybe some consulting....' I love my job and my work environment, just contigency planing, you know.
I obviously was working on the wrong contingency. I was just finishing a practice presentation before some faculty when I got a call that the listserv was going nuts. Stunned is not the word. I believe I am going through all seven stages of grief at once.
I won't rant the obvious other than I've seen this movie before and many people involved ran out screaming in frustration.
How am I to believe the sequel won't follow the same formula. This is not about innovation, it is all about grabbing intellectual property and shelving the pieces that don't fit in with their plan. Bborg as they have been named by the Angel community does not play well with others. Fitting with Star Trek and Angels and Demons oming out.
I have to agree with you, that on the surface it looks pretty bleak. However, I think this is the time when edtech can really take the next great leap out of the LMS. Social learning and social networking in general has gotten enough of a foothold to make this a viable option. While I am disheartened by this merger, I am excited to see what new innovations it may bring about outside of blackboard.
Blackboard buys ANGEL Learning Systems
Blackboard has just announced that it is buying ANGEL Learning Systems. This is a huge move in the learning management market. ANGEL has been snatching up Blackboard’s costumer’s, especially in the community college market, left and right. Now, ANGEL customers will be forced into the Blackboard product line with the release of Blackboard NG. Blackboard
ANGEL is a private company and was purchased for 95 million dollars. The deal is expected to close this month. Blackboard is also involved in an ongoing legal brawl with one of the other main players in the LMS market, Desire 2 Learn. If Desire 2 Learn were to crumble under Blackboards legal pressure it would leave the open source product, Moodle as one of the only strong options outside of Blackboard.
The anti-trust problems of Microsoft come to mind when I look at this shift in the LMS market. With a community based LMS possibly being the only competition left for blackboard, could the feds get involved? Unfortunately for consumers, this means fewer options in the LMS market and most likely less innovation.
I must take a moment to express my distaste for this merger. I believe that competition fuels inovation and it frustrates me to see Blackboard taking such an aggressive tone in buying or suing other companies. Just think if blackboard used the 95 million dollars that they spent on ANGEL to improve their own product. If that were the case we could see some really compelling products. At the same time I am disappointed that ANGEL has decided to sell their company to Blackboard. ANGEL ,and it’s user base, has always prided itself on being agile and innovative, something that is about as far from Blackboard as anything. From my perspective ANGEL has lost sight of it’s users and joined ranks of the “Big Corporations.”
One outcome that is possible from all of this, is the death of what we think of as an LMS. Many people have been pointing to this for some time and the lack of options in the LMS world might be one major factor in bringing that to fruition. This combined with that fact that educators are getting more and more comfortable with using technology, we may see more and more mashups of different tools to create an LMS instead of a monolithic system.
Another possibility is that another major company will step in with a new product. For example google could expand their apps for education to include LMS like functionality, or Apple could expand ItunesU to a complete LMS.
Whatever the case, those who watch the LMS market should be in for a wild ride in the next few months and years.
ANGEL, Blackboard, LMS
This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 6th, 2009, 8:24 pm and is filed under News and Commentary. You can follow any responses to this entry through RSS 2.0. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.