Over the past several years, I have worked with EdTech companies of very different sizes and stages, from established platforms expanding beyond their home markets to fast-growing startups preparing for their first international move. The geographies have varied too: companies entering the Gulf states, Latin America, Southeast Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, and Europe. No two engagements ever looked the same, much as the underlying patterns are remarkably consistent.

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Our observation is that most companies tackle international expansion from a position of domestic success. That success is real, and it matters. What it does not do is prepare companies for how the education industry operates in another country. We are not referring to surface-level differences (which are easy to anticipate) but to the structural ones: how procurement decisions are made and by whom, how trust is built in brand new markets, what counts as evidence of impact in a context where potential clients are not familiar with an international brand, what the specific expectations of the key agents in the value chain are, and how long the entire process eventually takes.

‍

The companies I have seen scale internationally are not the ones with the largest teams or the biggest budgets. They tend to be the ones who understood, early on, that international growth in education cannot be exported. Indeed, growth has to be earned. Earned through the way you show up in a new market, the relationships you build with the people who help you reach your target audience, the differential value proposition that you bring to the local education context, and the institutional trust you accumulate over time. This process is slower than most leadership teams expect. It is also more sustainable and durable than any shortcut or quick fix.

‍

This report attempts to capture what we have learned from working alongside companies as they navigate internationalization. It does not offer a universal playbook, simply because no such thing exists. Instead, it offers a set of questions, observations, and patterns that we believe can help EdTech leaders approach international expansion with greater clarity, while avoiding some critical mistakes.

‍

Josep Maria Mas

VP of Consulting & Partner

EDT&PARTNERS

International expansion is rarely held back by ambition. It is held back by readiness.

‍

The case for growing beyond a single geography has never been more pressing. In the United States, domestic funding cycles have tightened considerably. The average U.S. district manages more than 2,000 EdTech tools, and the threshold for new adoption continues to rise. Federal education budgets face sustained uncertainty. Meanwhile, education systems across Latin America, Asia-Pacific, and parts of the Middle East are investing in digital infrastructure, teacher development, and AI-enabled learning at a scale that did not exist five years ago.

‍

Across other regions, companies are similarly pursuing international expansion to offset the constraints of stagnant domestic markets, reduce concentration risk, and capture demand early in countries where digital transformation is accelerating. For some time, South Korean companies have been targeting Southeast Asian markets such as Vietnam and Indonesia, while Singaporean firms are making inroads throughout Southeast Asia and even in the Middle East. At the same time, many companies in North America and Asia continue to monitor China closely, anticipating a potential resurgence of the private sector.

‍

Most companies that pursue international growth understand this opportunity. What they tend to underestimate is what it takes to convert opportunity into traction. Education systems differ from one another in the specifics that matter most: who makes procurement decisions and at what level, what counts as evidence of impact, how teachers experience technology in practice, and whether a foreign company can earn trust quickly enough to sustain a commercial relationship. A strong domestic track record does not resolve any of these questions. In many cases, it creates assumptions that obscure them.

‍

The companies that scale internationally in education are not the ones that export their domestic model into new geographies. They are the ones who learn how to earn legitimacy inside the system they enter. That legitimacy is built through contextual adaptation, deliberate market sequencing, and the discipline to invest in understanding a system before expecting returns.

‍

This report examines what earning legitimacy requires in practice. It is structured around the strategic questions that most often determine whether expansion produces durable growth or merely expensive experimentation: How to evaluate which markets to enter, what meaningful localization actually demands, how to navigate routes to market, and what traction looks like as legitimacy begins to compound. The observations draw on recurring patterns among companies navigating this transition and on conversations with EdTech leaders and operators across diverse education systems.

‍

Three things that distinguish EdTech companies scaling with intent

‍

1. They choose markets they can earn the right to compete in, instead of chasing TAM. Geography fit, regulatory readiness, and partner availability are weighed before the commercial opportunity.
2. They localise the operating model, not just the product, so the company functions inside the new system rather than against it. Decisions, hiring, evidence and partnership posture all shift; the brand, less so.
3. They invest in legitimacy before scale, treating early reputation as a compounding asset rather than a marketing line. Pilots are designed to produce defensible evidence, not testimonials, and partners are chosen for what they unlock institutionally, not transactionally.

‍

‍

To keep reading, please download the report.

Over the past several years, I have worked with EdTech companies of very different sizes and stages, from established platforms expanding beyond their home markets to fast-growing startups preparing for their first international move. The geographies have varied too: companies entering the Gulf states, Latin America, Southeast Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, and Europe. No two engagements ever looked the same, much as the underlying patterns are remarkably consistent.

‍

Our observation is that most companies tackle international expansion from a position of domestic success. That success is real, and it matters. What it does not do is prepare companies for how the education industry operates in another country. We are not referring to surface-level differences (which are easy to anticipate) but to the structural ones: how procurement decisions are made and by whom, how trust is built in brand new markets, what counts as evidence of impact in a context where potential clients are not familiar with an international brand, what the specific expectations of the key agents in the value chain are, and how long the entire process eventually takes.

‍

The companies I have seen scale internationally are not the ones with the largest teams or the biggest budgets. They tend to be the ones who understood, early on, that international growth in education cannot be exported. Indeed, growth has to be earned. Earned through the way you show up in a new market, the relationships you build with the people who help you reach your target audience, the differential value proposition that you bring to the local education context, and the institutional trust you accumulate over time. This process is slower than most leadership teams expect. It is also more sustainable and durable than any shortcut or quick fix.

‍

This report attempts to capture what we have learned from working alongside companies as they navigate internationalization. It does not offer a universal playbook, simply because no such thing exists. Instead, it offers a set of questions, observations, and patterns that we believe can help EdTech leaders approach international expansion with greater clarity, while avoiding some critical mistakes.

‍

Josep Maria Mas

VP of Consulting & Partner

EDT&PARTNERS

International expansion is rarely held back by ambition. It is held back by readiness.

‍

The case for growing beyond a single geography has never been more pressing. In the United States, domestic funding cycles have tightened considerably. The average U.S. district manages more than 2,000 EdTech tools, and the threshold for new adoption continues to rise. Federal education budgets face sustained uncertainty. Meanwhile, education systems across Latin America, Asia-Pacific, and parts of the Middle East are investing in digital infrastructure, teacher development, and AI-enabled learning at a scale that did not exist five years ago.

‍

Across other regions, companies are similarly pursuing international expansion to offset the constraints of stagnant domestic markets, reduce concentration risk, and capture demand early in countries where digital transformation is accelerating. For some time, South Korean companies have been targeting Southeast Asian markets such as Vietnam and Indonesia, while Singaporean firms are making inroads throughout Southeast Asia and even in the Middle East. At the same time, many companies in North America and Asia continue to monitor China closely, anticipating a potential resurgence of the private sector.

‍

Most companies that pursue international growth understand this opportunity. What they tend to underestimate is what it takes to convert opportunity into traction. Education systems differ from one another in the specifics that matter most: who makes procurement decisions and at what level, what counts as evidence of impact, how teachers experience technology in practice, and whether a foreign company can earn trust quickly enough to sustain a commercial relationship. A strong domestic track record does not resolve any of these questions. In many cases, it creates assumptions that obscure them.

‍

The companies that scale internationally in education are not the ones that export their domestic model into new geographies. They are the ones who learn how to earn legitimacy inside the system they enter. That legitimacy is built through contextual adaptation, deliberate market sequencing, and the discipline to invest in understanding a system before expecting returns.

‍

This report examines what earning legitimacy requires in practice. It is structured around the strategic questions that most often determine whether expansion produces durable growth or merely expensive experimentation: How to evaluate which markets to enter, what meaningful localization actually demands, how to navigate routes to market, and what traction looks like as legitimacy begins to compound. The observations draw on recurring patterns among companies navigating this transition and on conversations with EdTech leaders and operators across diverse education systems.

‍

Three things that distinguish EdTech companies scaling with intent

‍

1. They choose markets they can earn the right to compete in, instead of chasing TAM. Geography fit, regulatory readiness, and partner availability are weighed before the commercial opportunity.
2. They localise the operating model, not just the product, so the company functions inside the new system rather than against it. Decisions, hiring, evidence and partnership posture all shift; the brand, less so.
3. They invest in legitimacy before scale, treating early reputation as a compounding asset rather than a marketing line. Pilots are designed to produce defensible evidence, not testimonials, and partners are chosen for what they unlock institutionally, not transactionally.

‍

‍

To keep reading, please download the report.