2022 Review: What's the state of the VLE market in UK higher education?
Image by Reto Scheiwiller from Pixabay
During a period in which discussion of how AI is set to alter education and challenge long-standing orthodoxies, it feels somewhat antiquated to be talking about virtual learning environments (VLEs). However, these unfashionable digital technologies continue to be the mainstay of practically every UK university's digital campus.
Given that some were writing obituaries for the VLE in the mid-to-late 2000s they’ve been remarkably resilient. Even though digital advancements continue at pace, there are no obvious signs that the VLE is going to disappear from the UK HE landscape anytime soon.
For some, this acts as confirmation of the conspicuously old-fashioned nature of UK higher education when it comes to digital technology. However, whatever stance you take on that, it’s undeniable that VLEs continue to play an important part of the digital education experience in UK universities today.
It’s been a year since I last posted on the current state of the VLE market in UK higher education. This market by the very nature of the product and the lengths of contracts between companies and universities is relatively slow moving. However, there have been a number of interesting developments and noteworthy news in the last 12 months to reflect upon.
What’s the overall picture of VLE use in UK HE?
This year I conducted research and analysis on 179 higher education institution’s (HEIs) in the UK in order to understand shifts in the market and market share for VLEs. This is a slight increase on the 176 HEI’s covered in last years research.
Similarly to last year I should caveat these figures by saying that they relate to the core VLE used by the majority of students who are mainly studying campus-based courses.
It is not uncommon for universities to operate multiple VLEs but they all have a core VLE and any others tend to be for more specific purposes. One example of this, is universities using a different VLE for online distance programmes that they run in partnership with OPMs.
Proportion of VLEs being used by 179 UK HEIs researched as of the end of 2022.
Unsurprisingly, the main four providers Blackboard, Moodle, Canvas and Brightspace continue to have the vast majority of the share of the market. Although market share does not radically alter every year, there have been a number of notable developments and continuation of trends amongst some of these companies.
A new look for Moodle
Moodle continues to be the VLE used by most UK HEIs and in April 2022 they released a new version - Moodle 4.0. This wasn’t pitched as some major tooling up of the platform, but was fundamentally about improving and modernising the user experience. Phrases such as “fresh” and “intuitive” and “contemporary look and feel” were scattered across the comms and announcements for this new version.
These are undoubtedly important improvements for a VLE like Moodle, because the user experience and the aesthetics of longer-standing products have been a regular source of criticism. Institutions who have moved from the likes of Blackboard and Moodle in recent years to products like Canvas have often sighted its ease of use and more modern look and feel as justifications. Whilst some may dispute that characterisation of Canvas, there’s no doubt that these things and the perceptions around them matter. So an improved and more intuitive, contemporary look and feel to Moodle, is ultimately a good move for them.
Whether the new and improved Moodle will result in an increase in new implementations in UK universities remains to be seen. Unlike previous years, in 2022 there were no UK universities switching away from Moodle but there were no new implementations either, so it’s a case of as you were.
The continuing decline of Blackboard
Although Blackboard retains 2nd spot there continues to be a steady stream of universities leaving it behind for other VLEs. In 2022, a further two UK universities switched from using it and there are a further two who currently use Blackboard looking for a new VLE.
In recent years Blackboard has had success in terms of moving university clients to cloud deployment and the adoption of the not so new user experience design of the platform called Learn Ultra, but in spite of that, the downward trend of losing university clients continues unabated.
The stone keeps rolling down the hill for Blackboard and even its 2021 merger with Anthology does not seem to have had a significant effect in the UK. It is however still the VLE used by the most number of Russell Group universities (over 40%) including some large ones, some of which have renewed their deals in recent years.
Momentum shifts from Canvas to Brightspace
Canvas has had a huge amount of momentum in the past few years resulting in a number of UK universities adopting their VLE. However, 2022 was a much quieter year for them with no new major adoptions from UK universities.
Instead, it has been Brightspace from D2L that has been the major winner in terms of VLE adoption in the UK, adding a further two UK university clients this year. It is evident that both in the UK, North America and Europe they have the most momentum and number of new adoptions.
Although this market shifts slowly over a long time period, it’s difficult not to envisage a scenario in which the market share of Canvas and in particular Brightspace grows in the coming years mainly at the expense of Blackboard.
The demise of Aula as a player in the market
One of the frustrations and limitations of the VLE market is the quadropoly that exists. Last year I sounded a more hopeful note that new-ish entrants like Aula and Insendi might stir things up.
Aula in particular was gaining a bit of traction and had been adopted by three UK universities. However, 2022 essentially saw the demise of Aula as an option for universities in this market as they were bought by Coventry University for what was rumoured to be a nominal sum.
Any company looking to enter this space faces a tough challenge to compete with the big four and it seems that although Aula had some success, they essentially ran out of appetite to keep going and secure further funding and growth.
In the year or so leading up to this they had begun to develop a learning design strand to their business, essentially adding that service to a product-based business. During the pandemic, Coventry University entered into a contract with them worth £1 million to use their learning designers and services to “transform..modules…so that they are suitable for online and blended delivery”.
I think it’s fair to say that feedback was mixed in respect to learning design services offered and these aren’t services that are easy to develop and scale quickly and effectively. It is clear from the sale announcement that they were intending to continue to run a learning design based business called Plot, focussing on developing a product for learning design, but this ultimately failed and never materialised in the marketplace.
Although Aula still exists and is used by two other universities, one is actively looking for a new VLE and will be moving away from Aula. It’s hard to imagine anyone who isn’t Coventry using it in the medium to long term as there is arguably a greater level of risk and potential conflicts arising from using it which don’t exist with other VLEs.
Different options and newer entrants are limited to small HEIs
It’s still difficult to see any serious competitors to the established big four and those reflecting on the experience of Aula, may be even more reluctant to bet on an upstart company to provide such a central piece of the digital campus.
One company that is a relatively new entrant being used by one small UK HEI is Eduflow which was developed off the back of a product called Peergrade. As was the case with Aula, it’s a refreshing counterpoint to what currently exists, but it is difficult to envisage it making inroads as a true competitor to the big four particularly in larger universities. Understandably, Eduflow seems to be hedging its bets in terms of target audience with clients in both higher education and corporate training being sought after.
For a few years some have talked up Microsoft Teams as a de facto VLE and serious disrupter or competitor in this space. Given that the majority of UK universities already have Teams and its use became widespread from the onset of the pandemic there’s a certain logic to this case. However, whilst there are a couple of small HEIs who use Teams and the Google Suite as de facto VLEs there’s no significant evidence of any universities making major moves to replace their VLE with Teams.
What does the future hold?
The years of maximum disruption caused by the pandemic are increasingly in the rear view mirror and this certainly impacted some scheduled institutional reviews of their VLE and led to some shorter-term renewals to allow time to review. In the next couple of years we’re likely to see more changes of VLE amongst UK universities. The recent UCISA TEL Survey highlighted that over 50% of universities who responded (n=76) planned to review their VLE in the next two years.
Based on the trends and patterns of recent years and outside the UK, it’s hard not to see more universities using the likes of Canvas and Brightspace and Blackboard becoming a more peripheral player in the market.
The demise of Aula and the marginal gains of newer entrants such as Insendi and Eduflow highlight just how difficult it is to break into this market. In the UK it seems as though universities want to consolidate the number of technologies they support rather than have variety and spread and one can understand this. Arguably, this further reduces the opportunity for newer entrants to make inroads.
Whilst new entrants and products would undoubtedly freshen up this space and offer greater and arguably better choice for universities, at this stage it's hard to see where that is going to come from.
One thing is for certain, the VLE is set to continue to be the main hub of UK universities digital campus for some time to come. For all the talk of AI and other advancements, many universities continue to grapple with fundamentals such as digital accessibility, the consistency of student experience across the VLE and things that were talked up years ago like learning analytics. In this latest period of fervent discussion about what technological change means for higher education, it’s worth remembering that the pace of digital change outside, often runs differently to within universities.
