SCOTTISH Equity Partners has spearheaded a $22 million (£14.3m) investment round into Babbel, the language learning app.
The backing is aimed at maintaining growth of the company, which has been profitable since 2011, while allowing it to invest in new product development.
The fresh investment has also been supported by existing investors Reed Elsevier Ventures, Nokia Growth Partners and VC Fonds Technology Berlin, managed by IBB Bet.
Babbel, whose mobile app is seeing up to 200,000 downloads per day, allows users to learn 14 languages, available for display in seven languages.
The subscription-based app, whose courses are available for iOS, Android, desk top and Apple Watch devices, is aimed at people outside the formal education system.
According to Babbel, the bulk of its users are aged between 45 and 70, with French, German, Spanish and Italian the most popular languages studied.
The company currently has more than 350 staff in its offices in New York and Berlin.
Markus Witte, founder and chief executive, said: "In SEP (Scottish Equity Partners) we've gained a high-profile partner that shares our vision of making learning easy and fun for everyone.
"This investment enables us to fully capitalise on a significant market shift towards self-motivated learning."
SEP partner Stuart Paterson, who has joined the board at Babbel, said: "Babbel sets the standard for online language learning, and its strong international footprint is a reflection of that.
"We see significant growth potential in this market and are delighted to support the company as it executes its expansion in the Americas."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article