Houlihan Lokey Advises Totara Learning

Houlihan Lokey is pleased to announce that it advised Totara Learning (Totara), a portfolio company of Five V Capital, on its sale to Tenzing. The transaction closed on 12 October 2023.

Totara is a leading provider of highly configurable learning management system (LMS) software to enterprises worldwide and the driving force behind talent development for thousands of customers, reaching an impressive user base of around 20 million individuals across 140 countries. The business employs more than 100 people in offices in the UK, New Zealand, and the US.

Central to its success is Totara’s Talent Experience Platform (TXP), which consists of a powerful and flexible learning management system (Totara Learn) that orchestrates, delivers, and tracks formal or compliance training, a user-friendly learning experience platform (Totara Engage) for informal or social learning, and a performance management system (Totara Perform) providing personalised plans for learning and development. TXP is an all-in-one solution that meets mission-critical workplace learning and performance requirements. It is used by some of the world’s largest brands, including Sony, Samsung, Medtronic, Amazon Alexa, and Toyota.

Mark Ash, CEO of Totara, commented, “At Totara, our mission is to enable our customers to create high-performance workplaces by transforming how organisations understand, measure, and improve talent development. With Tenzing’s strategic investment, we’re poised to scale our impact on the global stage, offering highly customisable solutions that drive innovation and growth for our clients. Together, we’ll continue to shape the future of workplace learning and development, making it more personalised, effective, and accessible than ever before.”

Tim Cooper of Five V Capital commented, “We are delighted to have partnered with Totara’s Founder, Richard Wyles, and to support the business’ success to date. Since our investment in 2020, Totara has undergone a remarkable transformation, emerging as a globally recognised brand underscored by a flagship product, multi-channel sales approach, and a carefully executed USA strategy. Totara’s growth and global expansion have been facilitated by a leading global management team, driving a landmark transition of the business’ headquarters from Wellington to the UK. We are proud of Totara’s achievements and are excited to see the business continue to flourish with Tenzing’s support.”

Carl Lavin, Investment Lead at Tenzing, added, “We are hugely excited to partner with Mark, the Totara team and Totara’s partners to help the business reach the summit of its potential. We believe that Totara’s unique, highly configurable product offering, global footprint and ambitious management team provide the basis for strong growth in the coming years.”

Five V Capital, a certified B Corporation, is a private equity and venture capital fund manager based in Sydney with more than $1.5 billion of funds under management. Five V Capital’s unique investment approach is underpinned by a philosophy of alignment and is reflected in the team being the largest investor across its funds. This alignment between teams, investors, partners, and management is a key component of Five V Capital’s success. The firm’s current portfolio includes some of Australia and New Zealand’s leading companies, including Biopak, Sea to Summit, Orikan, 4Cabling, Automic Group, Mantel Group, Education Perfect, Openway Food Co., Penten, and APP Group.

As a private equity investor in high-growth UK and European SMEs valued between £10 million and £200 million, Tenzing works with niche market leaders and challenger businesses—ones that can transform themselves and disrupt the market in which they operate. The company is named after Tenzing Norgay, the Nepalese mountaineer who guided Sir Edmund Hillary in the first-ever ascent of Mount Everest, because his story represents the firm’s drive to support its portfolio businesses in reaching the summit of their ambitions—each and every time.

Houlihan Lokey served as the exclusive financial advisor to Totara. The transaction exemplifies the global strength and depth of the Houlihan Lokey team. The client and key shareholders were located in Wellington, Sydney, and London. The transaction required significant coordination across markets and navigation of complex cross-border legal, accounting, tax, finance, insurance, and contractual negotiation issues. Houlihan Lokey offered unparalleled support to Totara and its shareholders during the process.

This transaction builds on Houlihan Lokey’s market-leading position in the edtech sector. Other recent transactions include Twinkl’s growth investment from Vitruvian; the sales of QuestionMark to Learnosity, Kallidus to Apse Capital, Interactive Services to LRN, Verb to Paycor, and Trainor to Apave; Attensi’s venture funding from Delivery Hero; and Skillsoft on its Chapter 11 restructuring and subsequent sale to Churchill Capital Corp II. It also continues Houlihan Lokey’s leadership in advising the B2B and B2P learning sector, including the sales of Richardson Sales Performance to Truelink Capital, FutureLearn to Global University Systems, ICS Learn to Skill & You, and Circus Street to QA as well as the acquisitions of LifeLabs Learning by Atairos, Becker Professional Education and OnCourse Learning by Colibri, 360training by Vestar, American Outcomes Management by Ridgemont, and Corndel by THI Investments.

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