An exclusive story at Geekwire reports that Amazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN) has acquired TeachStreet, a five-year old startup that matches teachers and students in an online marketplace. No acquisition price was given.
The teacher-student marketplace will fall under the AmazonLocal daily deal service according to Geekwire. The recent announcement of the new iBooks textbook program from Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) and now Amazon’s acquisition of TeachStreet underscore the lack of attention some of the tech world’s biggest players have been paying to the education market. Strained budgets likely also have something to do with the lack of interest in the education market.
Neither Apple’s venture into textbooks nor Amazon’s venture into matching tutors and students is likely to change the face of education. But both represent efforts to chip away at an education system that has so far resisted a massive digital overhaul.