TopHat and textbook publishers

https://www.edsurge.com/news/2020-02-04-top-hat-raises-55-million-to-take-on-big-textbook-publishers

Mike Silagadze isn’t shy about his desire to take market share from the largest college textbook publishers through his classroom software company Top Hat. He believes his company’s brand of digital textbooks beats anything Pearson, McGraw-Hill and their ilk can provide.

Founded in 2009, Top Hat claims that 2.7 million students access its digital course materials, including those at 750 of the top 1,000 higher education institutions in North America.

Silagadze believes younger faculty members and future generations of college students will help drive institutions to adopt digital materials instead of print.

Top Hat has challenged tangible goods for a long time now. Its first offering was a digital version of clickers to measure student responses in the classroom. In 2017, the company launched a marketplace for e-textbooks, working with authors and offering openly licensed content from the likes of OpenStax as well.

Last year, the company ceased sales of individual assessment tools to instead offer a bundle of its products. Students pay $48 for one year of Top Hat’s products. Interactive textbooks on Top Hat cost an average of $35.

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more on Top Hat in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=tophat

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