ApplyBoard, a Canada-based cross-border student recruitment platform backed by education services provider Educational Testing Service (ETS), has secured $230m in a funding round led by Ontario Teachers Pension Plan, the Globe and Mail reported yesterday.
Existing backers including financial services group Fidelity also took part in the round, the newspaper’s sources said. Just under half of the money formed part of a secondary transaction.
The round is said to value ApplyBoard at more than $3bn and could still attract additional capital.
Founded in 2015, ApplyBoard operates an online platform that offers a standardised application for students to apply to several schools at once. The platform is also used by primary, secondary and tertiary institutions to recruit students.
ApplyBoard previously collected $53m in a series C extension backed by ETS, Index Ventures, Blue Cloud Ventures, Harmonic Growth Partners and unnamed investors in September 2020. ETS revealed its corporate venturing subsidiary, ETS Strategic Capital, the same month.
This followed a $72m initial series C tranche in March 2020, led by Drive Capital and also backed by Fidelity, Business Development Bank of Canada, Anthos Capital, Artiman Ventures, Garage Capital and Plug and Play Tech Center.
Anthos Capital led a $41m series B round in May 2019, when Artiman Ventures also participated. The latter had led a $12.8m series A round the previous June, and was joined by 500 Startups, Candou Ventures, Think+ and unnamed others.
