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Search resuls for: "edtech"


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Over the course of 20 years, Anne Dwane has made a name for herself as a successful entrepreneur and executive. For Dwane, her career as a startup founder and operator helped her find success as an early-stage investor. Dwane left Monster in 2008 to become the CEO of Zinch, an edtech startup that helped colleges recruit and students find programs and scholarships. With the guidance of a mentor, Chegg's CEO Dan Rosensweig, the experience also helped her understand that her superpower lay in helping early-stage companies grow. Village Global is an early-stage fund that leads seed and pre-seed funding rounds.
Persons: Anne Dwane, she's, Reid Hoffman, Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Dwane, I've, Chegg, Dan Rosensweig Organizations: Monster Worldwide, Business, Village, Georgetown University, Harvard Business School, Research, Monster, Accelerator Fund, Brightside, Airbase Locations: Palo Alto , California, Chegg
The past few years have been tough for edtech companies. In recent months, multiple edtech startups have raised fresh funding rounds while specifically touting AI as a core part of their business model. These deals could signal that AI is ushering in a new era for edtech companies, and VCs who invest in the space are excited about the renaissance. And Ednition, also one of Donnelly's portfolio companies, provides an infrastructure-as-a-service platform for other edtech companies to improve the data that goes into their AI models. That's why it's so important to invest in ed-tech AI startups that help people rethink how they interact with technology and learn new skills necessary to successfully enter the workforce, he said.
Persons: PitchBook, VCs, Brian Dixon, Dixon, we've, Numerade, Kapoor, Katelyn Donnelly, she's, I've, you'll, Donnelly, Avalance, OpenAI, we're, ChatGPT, Ryan Craig, Craig, edtech Organizations: Business, Labs, Kapor, Partners, Chingona Ventures, TechCrunch, Kapoor Capital, Lirvana Labs, Odyssey Education, University Ventures, ACT Locations: VCs, edtech
Newly launched startup Superintelligent is betting it can solve this problem and help more people master using AI in their work and personal lives. The company just exited stealth with $2 million in pre-seed funding from Learn Capital, an edtech-focused VC fund. Based in New York, Superintelligent is a learning platform designed to help people understand how to use AI tools. "People who never would have cared about taking an online course before will 100% find themselves looking for online tools for learning AI." More broadly, AI is providing a boon to the edtech space, with startups such as Lirvana Labs, which provides AI learning for kids; Curipod, which lets teachers create AI lesson plans; and AI-powered study assistants Digest.ai and FoondMate all raising funding recently.
Persons: , OpenAI's DALL, Superintelligent, Nathaniel Whittemore, Whittemore, Digest.ai, he's Organizations: Service, Pew Research Center, Learn, Business, Labs Locations: New York
Read previewAI has been a boom for the education space, and one startup just raised millions by convincing investors that large language models and generative AI will supercharge kids' learning. The startup, Lirvana Labs, just raised $5.3 million in seed funding from Kapor Capital, Transcend Capital Partners, and Chingona Ventures, Business Insider has learned. Lirvana Labs is betting that AI can counteract these trends. The startup's tech is available via a mobile app, which costs $9.99 monthly or $69.99 annually. Check out the 13-slide pitch deck Lirvana Labs used to raise its seed-funding round.
Persons: , Christie, Clement Pang, Pang, Christie Pang Organizations: Service, Lirvana Labs, Kapor, Partners, Chingona Ventures, Business, National Center for Education Studies, Nations Locations: Menlo Park , California, Lebanon
They don't replace the tech giants — they just get bought by the tech giants. A new paper by two leading scholars suggests that these days, Big Tech doesn't have to resort to buyouts to crush aspiring startups. At this point, Big Tech looks at promising startups the way evil alien empires in science fiction look at helpless planets. The data that Big Tech shares — or doesn't share — can play an instrumental role in shaping a startup's work. Finally, the big companies use their clout on Capitol Hill in an effort to impose stricter regulations on the startups they're ostensibly trying to help.
Persons: that's, That's, Joe Biden, Mark Lemley, Matt Wansley, they're, Wansley, Who, Lemley, Sam Altman, Satya Nadella, Barbara Ortutay, Florian Ederer, Elon Musk, OpenAI, Marc Andreessen, watchdogs, Ederer, Anthropic, Adam Rogers Organizations: Apple, Meta, Microsoft, Federal Trade Commission, Justice Department, Big Tech, Stanford University, Cardozo School of Law, Google, Facebook, Star, Yale, London Business School, Tech, Boston University, titans, IBM, Dells, Business Locations: Silicon Valley,
Signage at a Byju's Tuition Center, operated by Think & Learn Pvt., in Mumbai, India, on Friday, Feb. 2, 2024. It was most recently slashed to $1 billion, after BlackRock downsized its holdings in Byju's last month, according to media reports. Last Friday, major Byju's shareholders, including Netherlands-based global investment group Prosus, voted to oust founder Byju Raveendran as chief executive officer. Investors who attended an extraordinary general meeting "unanimously passed all resolutions put forward for vote," which also sought to change the board, according to a statement Prosus sent CNBC. "As the founders did not participate in the meeting, the quorum was never legitimately established, rendering the resolutions null and void."
Persons: Dhiraj Singh, Prosus, Byju Raveendran, Byju's Organizations: Bloomberg, Getty, BlackRock, Investors, CNBC, Honorable Karnataka Locations: Mumbai, India, Byju's, Netherlands, Bengaluru
Read previewThis as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Milda Mitkute, the cofounder of second-hand shopping app Vinted. But when you have 30,000 people on your site you need more servers and those invoices started going up to 200 euros. AdvertisementBut when we asked girls in Germany, France, and the US why they used Vinted, it was all about selling to earn some extra cash, authenticity, finding unique clothes, and consuming more sustainably. A life divided into projectsWhen you're young you think that the more you work, the more you're going to create. Mitkute stepped back from Vinted in 2017 and is no longer on the board but remains a shareholder.
Persons: , Milda Mitkute, Vinted, Justas Janauskas, Justus, VIRGINIE LEFOUR, Getty, let's, Jonas Gratzer, Malvina, I've, It's, Mitkute Organizations: Service, Business, Vinted, Accel Partners, Facebook, Spotify Locations: Vilnius, Lithuania, Czech Republic, Germany, Soviet, France, Vinted
Read previewThis as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Julia Stevens, a 25-year-old who recently moved to San Francisco. In August 2022, a few of my college friends who'd moved to San Francisco invited me to visit them. I'd traveled in Europe during college; even still, San Francisco was the most beautiful and striking place I'd ever seen. San Francisco was perfect for the career path I wanted to takeI majored in English and minored in environmental science. The cost of living is the biggest downsideI wasn't fully prepared for the high cost of living in SF .
Persons: , Julia Stevens, who'd, San Francisco, I'd, didn't, I've, I'm, outdoorsy, El Salvadorian, it'll Organizations: Service, Business, San, Facebook, Craigslist, Raleigh Locations: San Francisco, Raleigh, America, Europe, San, North Carolina, Santa Cruz, East
Read previewFormer SoftBank executive Marcelo Claure and serial entrepreneur and investor Paul Judge are in the throes of raising a new $200 million fund. The past year has been transitional for the fund since Claure and Judge bought the $100 million fund from SoftBank. Since then, there haven't been any new investments, but the two are poised to capitalize on the success of the first fund and are raising the second Open Opportunity Fund. He said that limited partners' interest has been positive overall since the Open Opportunity Fund's first fund has had so much success. AdvertisementJudge said that he expects the first Open Opportunity Fund to continue to deliver "top quartile" returns to its investors over the next five to seven years.
Persons: , Marcelo Claure, Paul Judge, It's, Claure, haven't, SoftBank —, I've, Judge, George Floyd's, Masayoshi, Shu Nyatta, Stacy Brown, what's Organizations: Service, Business, Opportunity Fund, Opportunity, Fund, Mastercard, Vista Equity Partners, Ventures, Sprint, Bicycle Capital, TechCrunch Locations: SoftBank, Atlanta, America
SoftBank-backed education startup GoStudent has initiated another round of layoffs, affecting over 100 people, Business Insider understands. Austrian company GoStudent, billed as Europe's first edtech unicorn, offers one-to-one video tutoring. GoStudent did not confirm the scale of the layoffs when approached for comment by BI. The business and strategy adjustments aim to make GoStudent fully profitable and cashflow positive "as quickly as possible," he said. The fresh round of layoffs is GoStudent's third following cuts in September and December of 2022, all previously reported by BI .
Persons: GoStudent, Felix Ohswald, I've, Ohswald, Studienkreis Organizations: Business, LinkedIn, BI Locations: Austrian, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, DACH
Insider has compiled a list of 100 people at the forefront of artificial intelligence . See who made the list for education, and read about how they're making an impact. download the app Email address Sign up By clicking “Sign Up”, you accept our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy . Advances in education tech aided by AI have investors abuzz and could change the landscape of learning as we know it. Here are our picks for edtech.
Persons: Organizations: Service, edtech
Experts say many of those workers will need to be retrained for new jobs to avoid being left behind. The US economy has struggled in recent decades to help workers adjust to job disruptions. Emerging generative AI technologies like ChatGPT could eliminate or change the nature of millions of jobs over the next decade. AdvertisementWhen Donald Trump promised to bring back manufacturing jobs before the 2016 election, he was speaking to the Americans who had been left in the lurch. But many overseas jobs aren't likely to return anytime soon, among the reasons job retraining was — and remains — necessary for impacted workers.
Persons: , Richard Baldwin, Seth Carpenter, Morgan Stanley, hasn't, Donald Trump, Michael Chui, Chui, Ethan Mollick Organizations: Service, Global, Economic, Institute, McKinsey Global Institute, University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, PricewaterhouseCoopers, IBM, Schools Locations: United States, Mexico
For the startup employees interviewed by Insider, the constant threat of layoffs is having a detrimental effect on company morale. said one employee working at a growth stage startup that's conducted three rounds of layoffs this year. For Reay, the former Sendoso employee, constant rounds of layoffs gave him and his surviving colleagues "strategy whiplash." "When it happens again, you start to lose that confidence and faith in your leadership." Some startup employees are reconsidering their future in the industryAs startup employees brace for the potential of more job cuts, they say that the experience has them second-guessing whether to stay in the industry at all.
Persons: Sean Reay, it's, Reay, SoftBank, Sendoso, what's, I'm, Raey, SchoolMint, I've, you'd, he's, Jackie Xu, Xu Talent, Kleiner Perkins, Xu, you've Organizations: Facebook, Meta, Twitter, Sendoso, GV, Google, Employees Locations: San Diego, That's, SPAC
These people were employees of GoStudent, an Austria-based online-tutoring startup that had quickly become the darling of the European tech scene. But 28 current and former GoStudent employees and tutors said they experienced a poorly run organization with clumsy management. Edtech companies "rarely have any major competitive advantage other than scale," a European venture capitalist who's not affiliated with GoStudent said. A GoStudent employee threatened to track down the petition's author using tutors' IP addresses, according to the German publication Handelsblatt. According to public documents updated in December 2022, GoStudent had shrunk to 15 markets and 1,500 employees, including its acquisitions.
Persons: Felix Ohswald, Gregor Müller, GoStudent, who'd, I'm, Heinz, Peter Meidinger, cofounders, Ferdinand von Hagen, Prada, GoStudent's, Dave Benett, Müller, , Ohswald, Anthony Canavan, Canavan, Brutkasten, Norbert Wess, Harry Murphy, Duncan McIntyre, McIntyre, Neel Gupta, Anna Tuchy, Patrick Nadler, Nadler, Sarah Heuberger, Ross Slater Organizations: German Teachers ' Association, Employees, GoStudent, Conseil, prud'hommes, DBS, Safety Officers, Web, Getty, JP Morgan, Barclays, Deutsche Bank, TechCrunch, Organisation for Economic Cooperation Locations: Vienna, Austria, Silicon Valley, North America, South America, Europe, London, France, Soho , London, Dock, DACH, Germany, Switzerland, Spanish, Sweden, Swedish, GoStudent, Ukraine, Ibiza, GoStudent's, Deliveroo
Experts predict the role of hotel concierge is a profession example of where analyzing decades of data and experience can allow an AI assistant to guide human workers to the best decisions. San Francisco was an obvious choice: "This is the epicenter, where all the work is happening," said Vijay Karunamurthy, Field CTO at Scale AI, which plays a key role in providing the data to AI companies whose large language models need to advance their exponential learning. "A couple of square blocks around our office in Mission, you have OpenAI, Google, Meta… pretty much everyone is flocking here. 1 predictor of success in a higher education program is the removal of life barriers. "A model that understands where you are in your journey and can understand those challenges and relate."
Persons: Alistair Berg, Digitalvision, VCs, CNBC's, Vijay Karunamurthy, Julia Boorstin —, Omer Davidi, Shah —, — Karunamurthy, Shah, Dan Rosensweig, ChatGPT, Chegg, Organizations: Google, CNBC Senior Media, Tech, CNBC, Fortune Locations: San Francisco, Francisco, Mission
Tech companies by the dozens wanted a chance to prove their software was what schools needed. Clark County schools in the Las Vegas area, for one, signed contracts worth at least $70 million over two years with 12 education technology consultants and companies. The pandemic sparked a boom for tech companies as schools went online. Clark County schools spent more than $7 million on Achieve3000 apps. The Jefferson County district signed contracts with online tutoring companies Paper and FEV for a combined $7.7 million.
Persons: Chris Ryan, , Ryan, Lynn Knight, , Bart Epstein, Lorena Rojas, Edmentum, edtech, ” Epstein, Kia McDaniel, Sharon Lurye Organizations: WASHINGTON, Tech, Associated Press, Schools, AP, Revenue, Harvard, Department, , IXL, Carnegie Corporation of New Locations: America’s, Clark County, Las Vegas, edtech, Nekoosa , Wisconsin, Clark, Norway, Germany, Louisville , Kentucky, Jefferson County, Prince George’s County, New Orleans, Carnegie Corporation of New York
The edtech startup SchoolMint, which helps public schools and charter schools increase and manage student enrollment, cut 29 full-time staff members last week, or 14.5% of staff, Insider has learned. According to multiple sources familiar with the layoffs, this was not the first time this year SchoolMint has eliminated head count. Before these cuts, there were over 250 employees at SchoolMint, according to sources and LinkedIn data. The layoffs at SchoolMint come at an uncertain time for the edtech market, as the sector's pandemic-induced capital boom has seen an increasing slowdown. SchoolMint itself has not been immune to this uncertainty in the broader edtech market.
Persons: SchoolMint, It's Organizations: NewSchools Venture Fund, Reach, Investment Partners Locations: SchoolMint, Silicon Valley, Lafayette , Louisiana
The days of easy money are over as entrepreneurs face a funding winter amid a slowing global economy — and start-ups in India are not exempt. According to a local report, venture funding came in at $2.19 billion from January to March, dropping from the $11.34 billion invested in the same quarter last year. However, there are sectors that have "demonstrated resilience amid challenging times," said Pooja Chhabria, LinkedIn APAC's head of editorial. "Fintech remains a bright spot for investors despite the downturn, especially as we see funding on the recovery path and global tech giants eyeing fintech in India," she added. "The rise of edtech also underscores the continued demand for upskilling among professionals and students, especially with rapid changes due to technologies such as AI."
Persons: Pooja Chhabria, edtech Locations: India
At 17 years old, Quddus Pativada was determined to do something about inequality in education. Now, three years later, the 20-year-old Pativada has turned his high school vision into a full-fledged startup, with 8 employees globally working on his AI educational assistant ASI, formerly known as Digest.ai. Pativada set out to create a new AI-powered studying assistant nearly a year before ChatGPT debuted on the world stage. After more interactions, the AI tutoring bot can pick up on what a student is good at and where they may need more help, to further personalize the experience for that learner's needs. Pativada's grand vision for ASI is still to offer personalized tutoring for individual students, but to also market the learning tool to governments and businesses for quick, personalized employee upskilling.
Persons: Quddus Pativada, Pativada, Mark Cuban, Deborah Quazzo, ChatGPT, Khan Organizations: TechCrunch, ASI Locations: Dubai, Ghana
"Instead, I wanted this interactive lesson tool where students can express themselves and have agency — the opposite of this lecture model." With Curipod, teachers can create lessons on any school subject using generative AI, first by inputting the subject of the lesson, the grade level, and any additional learning objectives. Curipod is free for teachers and students to use at the moment, with paid tiers for school districts, said Seip. The team only launched its AI product at the beginning of this year, and had not previously sought venture capital funding. Check out the nine-slide pitch deck that Curipod used to raise $4.6 million in seed funding.
Persons: Jens Aarre Seip, Seip, Eirik Hernes Berre, Frikk Fossan, Curipod, GPT3 Organizations: Norwegian School of Economics, Reach, aha, Emerson, Sondo, Edovate Locations: Norway
AI in Education Attracts Startups and CashIf generative artificial intelligence is going to upend learning, then startups and investors want to be part of it. Varun Gulati, CEO of LitLab, describes how his company’s AI tool can make learning to read more personal. And Reach Capital’s Jennifer Carolan explains why the generative AI boom is different from edtech investment trends of the past. This is part three of our series Reading, Writing, and Algorithms. Click the links to listen to episode 1 and episode 2.
Persons: Varun Gulati, Jennifer Carolan, Amogh Alva Vaz Organizations: Education
AI in Education Attracts Startups and CashIf generative artificial intelligence is going to upend learning, then startups and investors want to be part of it. Varun Gulati, CEO of LitLab, describes how his company’s AI tool can make learning to read more personal. And Reach Capital’s Jennifer Carolan explains why the generative AI boom is different from edtech investment trends of the past. This is part three of our series Reading, Writing, and Algorithms. Click the links to listen to episode 1 and episode 2.
Persons: Varun Gulati, Jennifer Carolan, Amogh Alva Vaz Organizations: Education
He started to see the potential for online language tutoring as a viable business model, since online lessons were cheaper than in-person lessons and class schedules were more flexible. In the summer of 2012, Bigai, Voloshyn and Lukyanov founded the online language learning startup Preply. Last month, Preply raised a $70 million Series C extension round with a combination of debt and equity led by Horizon Capital. Reach Capital, Hoxton Ventures and Owl Ventures, which led its previous $50 million Series C in 2022, also participated. The company's successful fundraising comes after a difficult year personally for the Preply team.
Persons: Preply, Kirill Bigai, Dmytro Voloshyn, Sergey Lukyanov, Bigai, Lukyanov, James Kim Organizations: Preply, Horizon Capital, Morning, Skype, Horizon, Reach, Hoxton Ventures, Owl Ventures, Datadog, Bain, Reach Capital Locations: Ukraine, Boston, Texas, Barcelona, Kyiv, Berlin, Czech, Russia
There are more than 50,000 US VC-backed startups, and many will be looking for capital soon. Some startups will be looking for funding in Q4 or be forced to look for a sale or shut down. The startup has followed the typical survival strategy of a desperate startup this year by first cutting costs with layoffs. We all know venture capital funding is tough to come by these days. Venture capital funding was overly abundant in the latter half of 2020 and all of 2021.
Persons: Melia Russell, Rob Price, It's cratered, Kyle Stanford, PitchBook, , they've, it's, aren't, Stanford Organizations: Morning, US VC, Venture, Stanford, Tiger
With Kinjo, kids can earn virtual currency called Robux by playing higher-ranked learning games. To earn these Robux, kids can spend real-world money, or they can play simple mini games to "grind" for Robux rewards. Kids who use Kinjo are three times more likely to spend time on games that are more productive than kids without Kinjo, Malcolm said. Many edtech gaming platforms are already on the market, such as the social-emotional learning game Social Cipher or the STEM learning game Royelles. Check out the 16-slide pitch deck that Kinjo used to raise $6.5 million in seed funding:
Persons: Charles Thornburgh couldn't, Thornburgh, Jim Breyer's Breyer, Kinjo, Laura Malcolm, Kinjo's, Malcolm said, Krishna Srinivasan Organizations: Austin, LiveOak Venture Partners, Silverton Partners, Jim Breyer's Breyer Capital, Roble, Robux, Roblox Locations: Roblox, Silverton, Austin , Texas, Fortnite
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