Academia Columbus has branches in Playa del Carmen in Mexico; Quito in Ecuador and in Santo Domingo de Heredia in Costa Rica.

The school chain will be managed as an independent company by Inge Groeneveld, who will continue to be the Marketing & Product Director and Katrin Uphoff will continue to lead the Sales and Bookings function.

Owner and founder of IEG, Antonio Anadon, announced the news to partners this week and his plans to further develop the Academia Columbus brand.

“I am proud to announce our plans to develop the Columbus brand in Latin America and the opening of new schools in Colombia, in Cartagena & Bogota,” Anadon said.

Inge Groeneveld will manage Academia Columbus as a new independent company

Ex-Owners of Academia Columbus, brothers Patrick and Christopher Thebing, will continue to own and run study travel agency, Kolumbus Sprachreisen, which is based out of Germany with branches in Hungary, the Netherlands, Finland and Poland. Their Thebing Travel Group also operates Hermosa Sprachreisen in Switzerland and Speak & Fun in Germany.

Academia Columbus has over 13 years of experience in the world of teaching Spanish and “enjoys an unquestionable international prestige,” said Anadon. “We are going to keep the brands separate because we think it is a great brand,” Anadon told The PIE.

IEG also owns the Solexico brand in Mexico, which Anadon said would also continue to expand but only within Mexico.

Groeneveld said, “I think this is a big step forward for Academia Columbus. Being a part of this big family will open many doors and it will create many opportunities for Academia Columbus as the Spanish Language school brand in Latin America.”

“We now have a bigger support network”

She emphasised that the brand would remain “the ´small´ personal school known for its very personal customer service, but we now have a bigger support network”.

And Christopher Thebing added that the decision to sell was not an easy one. “Academia Columbus was the first step we took in the language school industry and therefore, it was a decision that was far from easy for us to take,” he said.

“It was also important to us that there would be no changes to the team to ensure that our partners would not be affected and to make the transition as smooth as possible.

We firmly believe that we have found a great partner in the IEG who will continue to uphold and expand the high standards that Academia Columbus is known for.”

IEG teaches 35,000 international students per year from over 75 countries across all its divisions.