Laureate Education
Laureate Education, Inc. is a corporation based in Miami, Florida, United States. The firm owns and operates Laureate International Universities, with campuses in Mexico and Peru. The company is publicly traded on the Nasdaq. Corporate history Beginnings: 1998–2009 Laureate Education was originally created by Douglas Becker in 1998, as Sylvan International Universities, an operational division of Sylvan Learning Systems that would focus on post-secondary institutions. At the time, Sylvan was primarily focused on services for students in primary and secondary education through company owned and franchise locations. Sylvan International Universities' first acquisition was Spain's Universidad Europea de Madrid for $51 million in 1999. By 2001, the company had expanded to include institutions including Mexico's Universidad del Valle de México (UMV), Chile's Universidad de las Américas, Switzerland's Les Roches International School of Hotel Management, and 41% ownership of the online institution Walden University. In March 2003, the firm decided to focus exclusively on post-secondary education. It sold the K-12 business units, and the Sylvan name and trademark to Apollo Management, and in May 2004 changed its name to Laureate Education to reflect the new direction. Laureate took full control of Walden in September 2004, after purchasing remaining shares of the university