Blackboard, a company that designs an education software for school groups, has acquired mobile messaging provider Saf-T-Net for $33 million. Saf-T-Net develops AlertNow, which is a mobile messaging technology aimed to the K-12 marketplace.
AlertNow’s technology delivers voice, e-mail and emergency SMS messages at a rate up to 2.5 million per hour to parents, students and school administrators. The company, which sent 25 million message in February alone, has over 2000 schools using its product and will be used to Blackboard’s mobile technology. Saf-T-Net will also help Blackboard further its dominance in the the K-12 market; Blackboard’s software has been used predominantly by colleges and universities.
Currently, Blackboard provides software for 5000 educational institutions. The company recently boughtTerriblyCleverDesigns, a startup that helped create iPhone and other mobile apps for colleges and universities, for $4 million.
Nice to see Blackboard continue to grow and innovate (and acquire). Ok, And it’s always nice to see my DC and G-town homies doing executing.
mobile messaging is getting lot of traction these days…..
Cue early 2000s cliche logo with heavy dropshadow and swoosh.
Congrats to both the companies.
SMS alerts are a must have for schools, healthcare organizations, businesses etc.
Our company alerts360 offers a Saas based SMS platform for just this purpose.
We have recently launched in India where SMS is huge and will be launching in US soon.
Good idea. What the market needs now is another self-service SMS platform.
Sorry to be sarcastic.
If it is just simple messaging then I agree with you. But think apps/solutions for industries such as schools, healthcare etc.
We demoed a platform Alertu (from a company Waterfall) for our company. We haven’t made a decision yet, but I was impressed with the product after looking at ~10 others it stood out.
ps – I can’t believe Alertnow was acquired for that much, the product seemed very old like web 1.0
You must be thinking of a different AlertNow because that product was in 2,700 school districts nationwide and was the leading provider of SaaS to K-12. You certainly can not do that on Web 1.0.
For those looking for a premium, integrated messaging application: http://www.Regroup.com specializes in messaging that integrates with Facebook, Twitter, email, SMS, voice, and your own web platform. We’re a robust, SaaS platform that can provide anything from emergency messaging to an intranet 2.0 solution. We’re in several state school systems around the country, as well as non-profits and corporations.
Blackboard already has the BbConnect product, when they acquired the NTI ConnectEd notification system. Why purchase a similar product? Sound monopolistic to me…
Good idea. What the market needs now is another self-service SMS platform.
Interesting move here by Blackboard, thanks for the write up. There is a definite opportunity for SMS messaging in education. Not only can parents be kept informed by a relatively simple system, but it adds an additional layer of emergency communication capabilities and can streamline both internal and external notifications. At Globaltel Media, we have seen a particular interest in SMS technology for educational institutions looking to more efficiently communicate with both the parents of the students and with staff on campus. As schools begin to stray from the idea that all texting in education is a distraction, we will see schools start using this technology in some very impressive fashions.