Tellusgruppen's CEO Bijan Fahimi: “A good school for everyone requires a variety of options”
Published: April 27, 2023
Miscellaneous
Tellusgruppen began its journey as a family business nearly 20 years ago. In recent years, growth has accelerated, and since 2019, the company has grown by an average of 39 percent per year. All of its operations are at varying stages of development, and the advantages of being a larger company clearly outweigh the disadvantages.
– The main advantage of a family business like Tellusgruppen is the inherent drive to succeed. Not primarily for financial reasons, but because the family’s name is behind the company. “We want to create better opportunities for the future for all the children attending our schools. If we do this with a focus on quality, we’re also building a valuable company that our children or grandchildren can take over with pride,” says Bijan Fahimi, CEO of Tellusgruppen.
Since the business was founded in 2007—three years after Bijan Fahimi and Narges Moshiri, who would later become husband and wife, met—the company has grown steadily. This growth has come both through the acquisition of other schools and by starting new schools from the ground up, a process known as organic growth. Initially, the business focused entirely on preschools. Three years ago, in 2020, Tellusgruppen acquired its first elementary schools.
See also: Tellusgruppen's history
– One reason for expanding the company is that we can use shared resources more efficiently. Everything related to corporate governance—such as finance, recruitment, and marketing—costs less per school or preschool for each new operation we bring into the Tellus family.
– We grow through new ideas that come from acquisitions and from our colleagues. Tellusgruppen is a platform where the best ideas are developed.
Today, the Tellusgruppen operates seven elementary schools and 27 preschools. The total number of children and students is approximately 2,200, and several of the schools are located in the suburbs of Stockholm.
– Both my wife, Narges, and I came to Sweden from Iran in the 1980s. I believe we have a very good understanding of both integration and the challenges that exist in different social contexts. Our preschools are located in many different socioeconomic settings. This has given us insight into the importance of offering a diverse range of programs. A school that provides equal opportunities must not become a school that is uniform.
– Schools play a central role in providing students with reasonably equal opportunities in life, but this cannot be achieved through uniformity or political directives. Students with different backgrounds must be offered something other than a school that is identical to all other schools. Growing disparities in society require an increasing diversity of schools. Here, independent schools, with their flexibility and customer focus, have an important role to play.
Today, Tellusgruppen operates a preschool, elementary school, childcare, and educational services, providing a broad foundation for further growth.
– With more schools and preschools and a larger number of teachers and childcare providers, we can offer more children and families high-quality, safe, and value-adding educational programs. As a company, we gain a more stable and secure foundation on which to grow, which also leads to excellent career opportunities for all our teachers and staff. In addition, we have the opportunity to recruit top talent.
Through the 2022 acquisition of the native-language company Omniglot and, most recently, Språkservice 24, the company further expanded its operations and is now able to offer high-quality educational services to schools outside the group.
– We do not hesitate to allocate resources to initiatives that can improve our operations in both the short and long term. At the same time, we are resource-conscious and efficient, and we use our resources with care. This combination creates added value for everyone, including our shareholders. There’s a synergy here: when shareholders are satisfied, it becomes easier to attract capital to the company, which makes it possible to make new investments. This allows Tellusgruppen to become accessible to more children and students in more municipalities,” says Bijan Fahimi, CEO of Tellusgruppen.
