Massachusetts company specializes in Mandarin textbooks

International Herald Tribune
Massachusetts company specializes in Mandarin textbooks
By Robert Weisman
The Boston Globe
Tuesday, November 25, 2008

BOSTON: China is solidifying its role as a leader in the 21st century global economy. Career-minded college students in the United States are taking note. And that has created another opportunity for the publisher, entrepreneur and deal maker Nader Darehshori.

Capitalizing on a rush to learn Mandarin, the language of Chinese commerce, Darehshori's latest start-up, Aptius Education, of Wellesley, Massachusetts, has struck a partnership with a Beijing university publisher to distribute Mandarin textbooks and educational materials to colleges in the United States and other English-speaking countries.

"This is the fastest-growing language in higher education," said Darehshori, 71, a co-founder of Aptius who spent a dozen years as chief executive of the educational publisher Houghton Mifflin. "There are large numbers of American students and businesspeople taking Chinese. If you want to sell something in China, it helps to know their language."

While it is common for Chinese business travelers to have a working knowledge of English, comparatively few of their international counterparts have mastered Mandarin. But that is starting to change, said Dexiang Qi, president and editor in chief of Beijing Language and Culture University Press, which will supply Mandarin textbooks, CD-ROMs and video to Aptius.

The partnership, which had been months in negotiations, was formally established last week.

Under terms of the partnership, Aptius will market and distribute multimedia materials from the Beijing university publisher to English-speaking customers throughout the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, India and South Africa.

One factor in the new interest in China, suggested Qi, was the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing.

"Especially after the Olympic Games, more people want to learn Chinese," said Qi, whose university publisher exports materials for Chinese-as-a-second-language programs worldwide. In the future, he said, foreigners seeking to tap the Chinese market will be expected to know the language. "An interpreter is important," Qi said. "But to do business in China, you have to socialize with the Chinese."

Aptius was started about 18 months ago, after the indefatigable Darehshori sold his previous business, Cambium Learning - it focused on educational software and printed materials for special education - to the buyout company Veronis Suhler Stevenson.

For financial backing at his new venture, Darehshori tapped a Cambium investor, Bill Laverack, and Soros Fund Management, a private equity fund under the umbrella of George Soros. Together, they have agreed to provide more than $100 million in financing.

The goal, as with Cambium, is to build Aptius by rolling up smaller companies, this time in the market for vocational and technical training materials. The first acquisition came last July, when Aptius purchased Axzo Press of Rochester, New York, for an undisclosed price.

"What we've identified this time is a segment of higher education that's been underserved by the major publishers," said Laverack, principal at Laverack Capital Partners of New Canaan, Connecticut. "We're focusing on education of seven weeks up to two years for professionals that need certification in industry sectors. These could be health-care professionals, welders, carpenters, auto mechanics or someone who wants to run a hair salon or a nail salon."

While the sale of Mandarin-language educational materials would not seem to fit neatly into that market category, the common thread is an emphasis on career advancement. Many Aptius customers are the same junior colleges and community colleges that run certification programs for various professions.

Aptius anticipates the Mandarin program will be one of its fastest-growing niches in coming years. That will not make it easy for English-speaking students to learn the difficult Chinese dialects, but through the partnership with the Beijing university publisher, they will have more multimedia resources at their disposal than ever before.

"It's a very difficult language to learn," Laverack acknowledged. "But this is a very real opportunity because this Beijing university has lots and lots of content. And young people recognize that this is a language that could really help their careers."