Language Learning

Rosetta Stone in Eastern Europe

Harry TubbenFrankfurt (GER), April 2017 - (by Harry Tubben, Business Development Central Europe) Rosetta Stone has been helping people all around the world learn a new language for more than 25 years. In Eastern Europe in particular, users include both businesses and education institutions looking to implement language-learning programs. 

The company has enjoyed particular success in the K-12 education market. In Albania, through the reseller-partner Koral Inc., pupils can order Rosetta Stone licenses through their school. All individual expenses are refunded by the government. In addition, to access to Rosetta Stone’s digital program, the pupils also receive a book in which all exercises of the digital program are listed. Currently, there are 8,000 licenses in use for 2016 and 2017 in the country. Access is available to all languages, though the most used are English and German. The platform used both at home and in some school language laboratories.

In Bulgaria, the government allowed the Reseller Ballistic Cell to publish a website through which both regular and vocational schools can apply for Rosetta Stone licenses. The reseller’s promotional activities, coupled with the fact that the government allows schools to apply for subsidies for eLearning programs has helped growth in the country reach 8,000 licenses in the past two years. In this case, the pupils or their parents pay for the product themselves. For the next project, a concept in which the government refunds the parents for the purchase is being developed.

In the higher-education sectors in Armenia and Georgia, Rosetta Stone is used in various business, medical, and hospitality schools. In some Russian universities and business schools it is used for English as well as other world languages. There are additional higher-education users in Slovenia and Poland, and Kazakhstan is soon to join the list.

In some cases, the schools or universities get government funding. In the hospitality sector, Rosetta Stone is used for German, English, and French. In the medical and business sectors, English is the primary language.

Rosetta Stone also works with thousands of businesses around the world to implement language-learning programs for their employees. The company is active in Armenia and Georgia, where employees at various airports are trained using the language-learning solution.

There have also been promising contacts with business clients in Polish subsidiaries of international companies, and the first clients will hopefully be announced soon.

The company’s reseller network in Eastern Europe is expanding. In the Czech Republic and Slovakia, the focus is on K-12 education and the corporate sectors. There is also collaboration with large software providers that offer Rosetta Stone in a package with other software. In Poland, a project was recently launched with the military, and it is anticipated that other government bodies will follow.