Private equity funding provides promising outlook for training provider
One of the UK’s leading apprenticeship and adult education providers which secured private equity funding to become an independent business last year has significantly improved its performance over the last two years – despite the coronavirus pandemic.
Realise Learning and Employment Limited improved its financial performance by more than £1m ending 2020, with its recently filed statements displaying a positive net asset position and a debt-free balance sheet.
The company became a standalone training provider in October last year, with private equity investors Enact providing funding to support Realise’s management buyout from Interserve Learning & Employment.
Realise managing director Gregg Scott believes the financial results display the company’s increasing financial strength. He said: “The investment from Enact has allowed us to become a debt-free and financially stable business and the future is exceptionally bright with the business now a standalone, profitable entity.
“To post a significant improvement in our financial results despite the obvious difficulties and challenges of the pandemic in 2020, speaks volumes for the hard work, commitment and dedication of the entire team.
“As a management group, we made a conscious decision to deliver a ‘right learner, right programme’ strategy throughout the business to help drive a high quality of training and that continues to pay dividends.
“While some of the sectors in which we operate, including Hair and Barbering, have been affected by the pandemic, we have maintained our core programmes and a significant number of our learners have undertaken key worker roles.
“While it has been a challenging year, we made a significant investment to ensure we moved to delivering our courses remotely and remained fully committed to supporting our learners at all times.”
Amongst the achievements of Realise in 2020 were being awarded a large programme for the Department for Work and Pensions delivering apprenticeships to newly hired work coaches who will support the Covid-19 recovery.
In addition, the company successfully tendered for the devolved adult education contracts for Bradford and Kirklees and was awarded a place on the Sheffield City Region Adult Education framework.
Gregg added: “We have an experienced and talented management group which is fully committed to driving the business forward and delivering the very best training opportunities to our thousands of learners across the country.”
Chris Cormack, partner in Enact, said: “The management team outlined their vision for Realise when we met them in 2020 and we are delighted to support them, marrying our knowledge in acquiring businesses deemed non-core by a larger corporate group with their industry expertise.
“The management team continues to surpass our expectations, delivering an improved performance in 2020 which has continued this year, underpinned by a clear strategy with learner experience and people at its core.”
Realise is one of the largest apprenticeship providers in the UK, supporting more than 7,000 learners across a variety of sectors including childcare, health and social care, transport and business.
With its headquarters in Sheffield, Realise employs more than 300 people to help support businesses across the country with training and developing their talent.
Enact is a trading division of Endless LLP, specifically focused on providing transformational investment into UK based SMEs.
For more information, visit https://learning-employment.com/