Private equity-backed global schools group Inspired Education has bought Island Primary and Island Montessori.
Inspired announced the deal in a 5 June letter to parents of both schools before holding an information evening on 9 June to explain the acquisitions.
It’s the first time that private schools in Cayman have been acquired by a for-profit international group, as the owner of Cayman International School is a non-profit.
Mixed reaction
There was a mixed reaction from parents at the meeting, with some expressing concern about the potential impact of Inspired’s for-profit model.
While profit is the chief objective for Inspired’s investment backers, Island Montessori founder Jenn Cowdroy sought to reassure parents in a separate letter on 5 June.
“There will be no changes to our leadership team or staff,” wrote Cowdroy. “Our priority remains providing your children with an outstanding holistic educational experience in the same nurturing, community-focused environment you know and value.”
The Compass understands that some parents expressed concern about potential future fee increases, especially considering a recent fee rise at Island Montessori.
Others were optimistic that being part of Inspired’s global network could create opportunities for their children.
Inspired said it is one of the world’s largest operators of “premium schools”, with more than 95,000 students across 125 schools on six continents. That’s up from approximately 110 schools in 2024.
According to press reports, Inspired’s most expensive school, St George’s International School in Switzerland, charges more than US$120,000 per year.
According to The Times, Inspired’s founder Nadim Nsouli is a Lebanese-born former investment banker. Educated in the US, he is a resident in the Bahamas.
“Nsouli was a partner at a private equity firm that managed $40 billion of assets and has worked in New York as a corporate lawyer and in London as an investment banker for Morgan Stanley and JP Morgan,” the paper reported.
Nsouli, whose daughter died of brain cancer in 2012, established the Lyla Nsouli Foundation for Children’s Brain Cancer Research.
According to the latest accounts filed by Inspired at Companies House, the group posted revenues of more than 1 billion euros (CI$965 million) in the year to August 2025. In 2022, investment fund Stonepeak took a 1-billion-euros stake in Inspired, joining other investors that include Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund GIC, private-equity firm Warburg Pincus and family offices Oppenheimer and Mansour.
In recent years, private equity firms have invested billions in the education sector around the world.
“With high barriers to entry, durable cash flows and a churn of students of 10 per cent a year, it’s hard to not see how education fits pretty squarely in the centre for us,” Stonepeak’s James Wyper told the Financial Times newspaper.
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