Canada's learning technologies are HOT!

Most of what I see around learning and technology (especially as it relates to Canada) is focused on MOOCs (for lots of news and commentary, Stephen Downes is a must read). But, there seems to be less coverage on learning technologies or products/services focused on the corporate markets.  Maybe it’s a bit more fragmented as a market.

I’m not an analyst, so these are simply my observations. Here are some interesting new companies in the learning/technology industry and kind of chuffed that they are Canadian!

LMS’s are still part of the landscape…

• Learndot – a Learning Management System that calls itself a platform for customer, partner and team training. While the LMS market is crowded, there’s not many that focus on extended enterprise and it looks great too.
• Absorb - by Blatant Media out of Calgary,  Alberta based (hey, move west!), this organization has another one of the best LMS solutions for smaller enterprises.

Tools to develop training/instruction, especially those that are mobile, collaborative or unique are needed!

• dominKnow has Claro – which is an authoring platform for elearning developers
• Ngrain (OK, not new, but still cool and have new freebie – you can download the personal learning version of Producer on their site) – since the majority of their customers are likely niche industries, this organization doesn’t get as much press coverage as it should. I mean, 3D is cool.
• Kera - this is an interesting product – they offer the ability to push instructional elements to the website, like a more sophisticated online help (we’d call it performance support in the world of instructional design/learning). It’s an elegant way to provide end user training.

Games and Gamification are definitely trends

• Axonify – the gamification trend is red-hot and these guys have baked it into their custom products. I like that they’ve built it on spaced repetition as a core concept. That tells me they understand how learning works and aren’t just on the gamification bangwagon.
• Ayogo – interesting game maker, while their games are not focused on the organizational market, there’s certainly lots to like and learn from their approach.

There’s a market for content, too…

• Thinkific - this organization is offering online training for professional in a video format, and has a bright future if the media is right.
• Marketplaces for education are a model that has been tried a few times. I’d love to know of others that are working…

What other interesting learning technologies have you seen that are Canadian based?

About these ads