Warburg Pincus seeks buyer for software firm iParadigms

iParadigms, based in Oakland, California, makes Web-based technology for plagiarism prevention and claims that more than 1 million educators use its products to check students’ papers for originality and online grading. The company is estimated to have around $50 million of annual EBITDA and may fetch 15x that amount, or roughly $750 million, some of the people said.

All the people asked not to be named because the process is not public. Representatives for Warburg Pincus declined to comment, while iParadigms and Evercore did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Warburg Pincus made a controlling investment in the company in 2008 for an undisclosed amount.

IParadigms was founded by graduate student researchers at University of California Berkeley who created software to monitor the recycling of papers in their undergraduate classes.

Its product offerings, which serve more than 10,000 institutions in 126 countries, include Turnitin for instructors, iThenticate for research professionals, WriteCheck for students and Turnitin for Admissions professionals, according to its website.

Soyoung Kim is a correspondent for Reuters in New York.