SCT to Acquire Campus Pipeline
Campus Pipeline, Inc. announced that SCT has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Campus Pipeline.
Under terms of the agreement, SCT will acquire Campus Pipeline for $42 million in cash, subject to adjustment based upon an expected $15 million in cash on Campus Pipeline’s balance sheet. SCT will also be responsible for the rationalization costs and transaction fees, which are not expected to exceed $4 million. The acquisition has been approved by the boards of directors of each company and is subject to notification of current stockholders. Closing of the transaction is expected in approximately 15 days.
Campus Pipeline is expected to play a central role in fulfilling SCT’s new strategy for delivering enterprise-wide education technology solutions through SCT’s e-Education Infrastructure. Campus Pipeline expertise is anticipated to provide core technologies for the e-Education Infrastructure with industry-leading portal, platform, integration, and content management technologies designed specifically for higher education.
SCT’s and Campus Pipeline’s combined market leadership and expertise will provide institutions with an unsurpassed dedication to and focus on the business of higher education. SCT recently announced its e-Education Infrastructure for higher education, a strategic framework for leveraging an institution’s technology, systems, and services for greater operational effectiveness in teaching, learning, research, and administration. This combined focus provides new tools, technologies, services, and applications for online services, information access, and a rich and personalized education experience for an institution’s constituents with a flexible, user-centric approach reaching beyond the scope of traditional ERP systems, portals, and e-learning.
“This is a major development in SCT’s corporate evolution. With Campus Pipeline, SCT will accelerate its mission to respond to the changing environment and technology needs in education,” said Mike Chamberlain, president and chief executive officer of SCT. “SCT will broaden its offerings to include the capabilities required to build, manage, and extend the digital campus. Through this new relationship, we will provide current and future customers with an ideal infrastructure to build out their next-generation digital campuses, helping them deploy new technologies while getting the full value from prior IT investments.”
The uniting of the two companies is expected to result in greater innovation and quicker time-to-market for solutions that optimize both SCT and Campus Pipeline technologies. SCT recognizes that a central component of an e-education technology infrastructure is the enterprise portal that supports a single sign-on for users and provides a framework for aggregating and presenting functionality delivered through portal channels and Web Services. This capability provides for a standards-based plug-and-play framework for a new generation of integrated, modular, and component applications.
“SCT and Campus Pipeline make a great match,” said Randall Thursby, vice chancellor and chief information officer, Georgia Board of Regents. “SCT had the foresight to advance delivery of online services across the Web, and its e-Education Infrastructure mirrors the direction the market is now moving with unified technology environments. Add the Campus Pipeline product lines to SCT’s
e-education administrative/ERP capabilities, and you have the basic elements that allow them to make a major leap to the front of the solution providers in this market.
The Campus Pipeline™ Web Platform and Luminis™ product families provide SCT with a versatile integration platform; a powerful, standards-based infrastructure for future development; and a more flexible vehicle for distributing information and services. Deeper integration will also enhance the value of current SCT products – such as the market-dominating SCT Banner® and SCT Plus™ e-Education ERPsystems, the SCT PowerCAMPUS® e-education suite designed for small to mid-sized institutions, SCT Matrix™, SCT’s pioneering student management suite-with innovative, interoperable, user-centric technologies. SCT Matrix was introduced for the first time at
EDUCAUSE, a higher education industry conference.
Today more than 200 colleges and universities worldwide depend on Campus Pipeline technologies to build and manage their institutions’ unique vision of the digital campus. Based on open standards, Campus Pipeline technologies can be integrated with an institution’s choice of systems and applications, enabling an institution to connect information, resources, and constituents. SCT plans to continue support and development of these products, enabling customers to choose and integrate their choice of homegrown systems and applications including those from Datatel, Peoplesoft, WebCT, Oracle, etc.
“This agreement brings greater resources and opportunities to help us realize our collective vision of a unified digital campus,” said Tom Lewis, chairman and chief executive officer, Campus Pipeline. “Higher
education institutions can expect the same great products, innovative development, and customer service that they received from Campus Pipeline but now with the backing of a powerful market leader, SCT.”
In conjunction with this announcement some management changes are anticipated. Campus Pipeline’s offices will remain in Salt Lake City, Utah.
SCT was an early believer in Campus Pipeline, investing in the start-up phase of the company in 1998. The two companies have continued working closely over the past three years to develop, market, sell, and support integrated enterprise software. The merger was motivated by an interest in key Campus Pipeline technology and a shared vision of unifying the digital campus.
The anticipated Campus Pipeline acquisition follows earlier acquisitions this year of Applied Business Technologies and the Exeter line of business from Sallie Mae. Collectively these acquisitions are expected to significantly expand SCT’s ability to deliver on its vision of the e-Education Infrastructure and enhance its revenue base.
