Aula Education

What Aula Education does

Aula Education operates the Aula Learning Experience Platform (LXP), a community-first digital learning environment built for higher education institutions. The platform unifies a social Community Feed, rich content authoring (Journey), assessment and feedback tools (with native Turnitin integration), and an Engagement Dashboard powered by Metabase analytics. It supports LTI 1.3 interoperability with a broad ecosystem of third-party educational tools (BibliU, Future Learn, Leganto, Engageli, Planet eStream, Talis, H5P, Big Blue Button, Inspera) and offers native iOS and Android applications. Distinctively, Aula wraps this technology with Learning Design Coaches who provide hands-on pedagogical support for module redesign.

The platform is sold through enterprise subscriptions to UK universities on multi-year contracts, with Coventry University (the parent), Ravensbourne University London, and the University of the West of Scotland (UWS) as flagship partners. Scale metrics include 54,000+ educator-hosted spaces, 1.7M+ assignments submitted, 914,000+ posts published, and 4.7M+ messages exchanged across all partner institutions. A newer use case extends Aula into healthcare workforce education through Coventry University's co-location with NHS Community Diagnostic Centres.

Aula Education Ltd was founded in 2017 and pivoted in February 2020 to split its Learning Experience Platform from a learning experience design product. On 26 January 2022, Coventry University Group acquired the platform technology via Coventry University Enterprises Limited; the original entity retained the design product and rebranded as Plot. Aula now operates as a strategic product line within the Coventry University Group portfolio, employing 11–50 staff, holding WCAG 2.1 Level AA accessibility certification, and maintaining GDPR-compliant EU-hosted infrastructure.

Name

Aula Education

Legal name

Aula Education Ltd.

Website

https://aula.education

Company type

Private

Founded year

2020

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

11–50 employees

Short description

Aula Education is a community-first Learning Experience Platform for higher education, combining a social feed, content authoring, assessments, and engagement analytics. It is owned by Coventry University Group and serves UK universities, including Coventry, UWS, and Ravensbourne.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Higher Education Learning Platform

NAICS

Software Publishers (5132), Educational Support Services (61171)

SIC

Services-Prepackaged Software (7372), Services-Educational Services (8200)

akta.pro primary industry

Learning Experience Platforms (LXP) & Learning Portals (EDAFAAAB)

akta.pro secondary industries

LMS Integrations, Interoperability & Identity (LTI/SCORM/xAPI, SSO, APIs) (EDAFAAAI), Educational Digital Courseware & Learning Platforms (LMS-Integrated) (MPAJABAH), Learning Technology & LMS/LXP Implementation (BPACANAH)

Keywords

• Learning experience platform
• Higher education software
• Digital learning platform
• University engagement software
• Learning management system

Headquarters

HQ city

Coventry

HQ country

United Kingdom

HQ region

Europe

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Software

Cost components

Personnel, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales, Operations, Infrastructure

Revenue model

1. Learning Experience Platform Subscription: Aula generates revenue through institutional subscriptions paid by universities for access to its Learning Experience Platform. The platform is sold directly to partner institutions; pricing is quote-based and not publicly disclosed. Institutions renew contracts on multi-year terms (e.g., UWS renewed for 2 years).

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels2 records

Marketing channels7 records

Core offering

Aula Education operates a community-driven Learning Experience Platform (LXP) sold as an institutional subscription to universities and higher education institutions. The platform combines a social community feed, rich content authoring (Journey), assessments with Turnitin integration, and real-time engagement analytics powered by Metabase, replacing traditional LMS/VLE document repositories with a community-first digital learning environment.

Product overview

Aula Education offers the Aula Learning Experience Platform (LXP), a unified digital learning platform designed for higher education. The platform consists of the core LXP with integrated sub-products: Community Feed (social communication hub), Journey (rich content materials area), Assessment and Feedback (with Turnitin integration), and Engagement Dashboard (analytics via Metabase). The platform also includes Handin for assignment submission and grading, and a Student Success App for tracking learner progress. Mobile access is provided via native iOS and Android apps. The platform supports LTI 1.3 integration with third-party educational tools including BibliU, Turnitin, Leganto, Engageli, Planet eStream, Talis, H5P, Big Blue Button, and Inspera. The platform was acquired by Coventry University Group in January 2022 and continues to be developed as part of the group.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Aula Learning Experience Platform A community-first Learning Experience Platform for universities combining a social community feed, rich content authoring (Journey), assessments with Turnitin integration, real-time engagement analytics via Metabase, and LTI 1.3 integrations with third-party educational tools. Sold to higher education institutions on multi-year subscription contracts.
• Aula iOS App

Quantifiable outcome

• 78% of students reported feeling part of a community, compared to 41% Jisc sector benchmark
• +8 more outcomes

Named customers6 records

Segments2 records

Ideal customer profiles2 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Integration10 records

Feature8 records

Partnerships

Six partnerships are on record, tiered flagship, core and minor.

• Coventry University GroupflagshipStrategic or Co-development Partner · 26 January 2022Coventry University Group acquired Aula Education Ltd's Learning Experience Platform technology on 26 January 2022. Key team members from Aula Education Ltd's product team moved to Coventry University Group to ensure continuity. Matthew Sharp (formerly Engineering Manager at Aula) leads the team at Coventry University Group continuing platform development. Coventry University had been a critical partner and user of Aula prior to acquisition, helping shape the platform's roadmap over three years. The acquisition enables Coventry to shape the pace and direction of Aula's future development.
• University of the West of Scotland (UWS)coreStrategic or Co-development PartnerUWS is one of Aula's longest-standing partner institutions with 14,000+ students and 800+ educators regularly active on the platform across over a thousand spaces. UWS renewed their contract for a further two years. UWS was named Higher Education Institution of the Year at the 2022 Herald Higher Education Awards. 90% of UWS research was classified as world-leading or internationally excellent in REF 2021.
• MetabasecoreTechnology or IntegrationMetabase is used as the analytics tool behind Aula's Engagement Dashboard. It allows creation of custom visualizations providing data at both class and individual student levels. The partnership resulted in a joint case study published on Metabase's website, documenting how Aula listened to customer feedback and delivered smoother engagement insights.
• NHScoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerCoventry University became the UK's first higher education institution co-located in an NHS Community Diagnostic Centre (CDC). Aula provides digital learning spaces to support NHS workforce onboarding, training, and continuing professional development. The partnership aims to help the NHS expand its capacity to educate its workforce, with measurable engagement (70% post open rate, 81% progress tracker usage).
• AI Student Society at Coventry UniversityminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerThe first Aula Skunkworks project partnered the Aula team with the AI Student Society at Coventry University — a group of undergraduate and master's students. Students collaborated with Aula engineers, designers, and data engineers over a 3-day build sprint to prototype AI-enhanced features. Students received verified certificates for CVs and social networks.
• Plot (formerly Aula Education Ltd)minorStrategic or Co-development PartnerFollowing the Coventry University Group acquisition in January 2022, the remaining Aula Education Ltd team rebranded as Plot (plot.co). The learning experience design product technologies remain with Plot. A productive ongoing relationship is maintained between Coventry University Group (Aula) and Plot as they begin their next chapter.

Scale indicators12 records

Recent moves7 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• Instructure (Canvas): Global LMS/LXP leader widely used in higher education. Directly competes with Aula for university platform deals, with deeper feature breadth, larger sales force, and broader international footprint.
• Moodle: Open-source LMS dominating UK and European higher education. Aula explicitly positions against Moodle's content-repository model, and customer quotes cite Aula as a more engaging alternative.
• D2L (Brightspace): Cloud-based LMS/LXP platform used in higher education and corporate training. Overlaps with Aula in the LXP positioning and competes for similar institutional procurement budgets.
• Open LMS: Commercial Moodle provider serving universities with hosted and supported Moodle offerings. Targets the same UK and international higher-ed segment as Aula with a more established Moodle-based feature set.

Broad incumbents

• Blackboard (Anthology): Long-standing LMS incumbent serving major universities globally, now part of Anthology. Competes in the same higher-ed platform category with deeper institutional integrations and broader product suites.

Emerging players

• Degreed: Learning Experience Platform focused on workforce upskilling and skills development. Comparable in LXP category positioning though primarily corporate rather than higher-education.
• Panopto: Video content management and lecture capture platform used in higher education. Overlaps with Aula's Journey content area and integrates as an LTI tool, making it both a complement and partial substitute.

Regional players

• Tribal Group: UK-based education software provider offering student information systems and EdTech solutions to universities. Adjacent competitor in the UK higher-education technology stack.
• Unit4: ERP and student information systems provider with strong European higher-education presence. Comparable as a broader university technology platform vendor in the same procurement context as Aula.

Others

• Engageli: Virtual classroom platform integrated with Aula via LTI 1.3. Adjacent provider rather than direct platform competitor but overlaps in higher-ed synchronous learning use cases.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat5 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

Compliance4 records

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles3 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds5 records

Investors8 records

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A1 record

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Aula Education