By Dian Schaffhauser 10/05/11 A day after its acquisition of Blackboard was completed, Providence Equity Partners has begun leveraging its multiple investments in education technology. Two of its companies–Blackboard and Edline–have announced an immediate merging. Edline will become another division in Blackboard’s portfolio. Both companies sell learning management and mass notification products to the K-12 [...]

Like Edline, Blackboard can also be used by parents to keep track of what’s going on in the school and the classroom. Depending on how well teachers embrace the technology, Blackboard and Edline can do a lot more than help parents keep track of whether their kids are turning in homework.

Blackboard is expected to be merged with Edline LLC, another educational software firm. Providence purchased Edline in 2009.
Standard & Poor’s cut its corporate credit rating on Blackboard, to B+ from BB-, after the acquisition was announced.

Edline LLC (“Edline”) has been acquired by an affiliate of Providence Equity Partners. MHT acted as the exclusive advisor to Edline.