Vital Source Acquires CourseSmart

Vital Source Acquires CourseSmart

• By Rhea Kelly
• 03/03/14

Vital Source Technologies, the e-learning content arm of Ingram Content Group, has acquired CourseSmart, a provider of digital textbooks in the higher education market.

CourseSmart was founded in 2007 by publishers Macmillan, Cengage Learning, John Wiley & Sons, McGraw-Hill Education and Pearson. Today it boasts millions of users around the globe and offers access to more than 90 percent of core higher education titles as e-textbooks, along with a large catalog of e-resources and digital course materials. The company recently released a data analytics platform that measures students' engagement with textbook content.

Vital Source plans a full integration of the CourseSmart product with its reader platform and distribution network. According to the company, the merger will provide more options for institutions, more inventory for faculty and course designers and greater scalability for content creators and resellers. Vital Source says it will remain committed to pioneering new technologies in areas like accessibility and analytics.

"By integrating the strengths of CourseSmart with Vital Source, we are creating an extensive global sales channel for publishers and bringing the best in digital learning technology and accessibility to the higher education community," said John Ingram, chairman and CEO of Ingram Content Group, in a press release. "We are strengthening our services in the higher education market and reinforcing our commitment to helping publishers, institutions, educators and students navigate the evolving landscape of digital learning and succeed by providing them with content in any format."

"Since its founding, CourseSmart's innovative services have led the company to become a leading higher education platform for institutions, professors and students to discover, adopt and purchase course materials," commented Will Ethridge, chairman of CourseSmart, in a prepared statement. "By becoming one company, CourseSmart and Vital Source will be able to further accelerate the adoption of digital learning materials to these audiences, while providing more effective distribution and customer relationships for authors and publishers as well."

Customers of both CourseSmart and Vital Source will not experience any immediate changes to their service, according to company representatives. All products and services will be maintained and supported until the full system integration occurs.