“Room to grow” for EduFocal

Co-founder and CEO of education technology company EduFocal, Gordon Swaby, says he believes the company still has tremendous room for growth despite the resumption of face-to-face learning.

EduFocal raised $130 million dollars through an Initial Public Offer (IPO) last week. The offer, led by Mayberry Investments, was oversubscribed in just one minute.

Roughly 80 million shares were available to the public with the share price set at $1.00 per share.

The company will now apply to be listed on the Junior Market of the Jamaica Stock Exchange.

Edufocal Learn provides students in grades 4-6 with test preparation for their Primary Exit Profile (PEP) exams.

The company recorded a major boost in revenue in 2020 as parents and students turned to the platform when in-person learning was suspended because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

In 2020, the company recorded $102 million in revenues, up four-fold from $26 million in 2019. According to Swaby, the pandemic did not cause the company’s growth, but accelerated it.

“People spend a lot of time looking at the 2019-2020 jump but they didn’t spend a lot of time looking at the 2018-2019 jump, even though we had a loss, that was more than doubling our revenue in one year,” he noted.

The CEO said while the company is focusing on strengthening its core offerings, it has the potential to expand into other areas and exams.

“If you think about EduFocal as just a PEP platform, you’re missing the bigger point. We have a powerful platform that can facilitate any exam type,” he said, adding that there’s the possibility of expansion into CSEC (Caribbean Secondary Examination Certificate).

However, Swaby said the company does not want to stretch itself too thin, a philosophy he learned from his father.

“What we’re doing is creating an industry; there’s no EdTech industry in Jamaica. It is being created as we speak and EduFocal is at the forefront,” Swaby said.

Through its Edufocal Business arm, the company also offers access to its proprietary platform and creates learning content for others. Swaby said that EduFocal Business accounts for roughly 40 percent of revenues.

According to the IPO prospectus, EduFocal is looking to expand its reach in the country.

“We see opportunities to leverage sales through key physical distribution points across the island for our current offerings, diversify the use of our proprietary learning management system in tertiary environments, developing non-traditional educational content for sale (for eg, financial literacy or interactive content for financial compliance) and other initiatives that will significantly add to our bottom line without material impact on our operating expenses,” the prospectus reads.

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Sashell Williams2024-09-03T21:40:31-05:00