Learn Capital backs and builds tech-enabled companies to reduce inequality of opportunity within and between countries, improving educational outcomes and helping excluded groups get better access to learning.
A pioneer as the first venture capital firm focused exclusively on education technology, Learn Capital has used this first mover advantage to establish itself as a leader in the sector, having backed more breakout EdTech companies than any other fund. It is now seeing exceptional growth in the sector, which has been transformed by and is powered by generative AI and AI broadly.
Founded in 2009, the company established the first Fund focused on this sector. It now has US$1.2 billion in assets under management, has reached over one billion people across the globe through its investments, and provided “top-tier non-concessionary returns and that unleash huge impact.”
Learn Capital is now raising its fifth fund so it can continue to back and build rapidly scaling tech-enabled companies that tackle the world’s biggest human-centred problems. It is advancing “human flourishing” by transforming access and quality metrics that underlie lifelong learning and gainful employment, health and well-being, reduced inequality, and economic growth.
I recently spoke to Founder and Managing Partner, Greg Mauro, to discuss some of the fascinating and innovative companies that Learn Capital backs and builds.
Greg explained, “Our venture thesis is to invest in stuff that is transformative. We’re looking for disruptive companies. The big sectors that we like to address are childcare, K-12, higher education, workforce, disabilities, and mental health. Our broad theme is basically looking for AI-led personalised, outcome-based experiences.”
“What’s beautiful about the digital revolution in this space is we go from analogue to education; everybody has a theory on what constitutes good education and how to get one. But when you get to digital, what is good can be evidenced through the ones and zeroes. When it works, it works. Therefore you should be able to scale it, and you should be able to base guarantees around their outcomes.”
For example, “If your goal is to get a job and get trained in a certain area, if you don’t get the job, you shouldn’t have to pay. That’s outcome based experience or outcome based financing.
He recognises that when it comes to social impact “there’s not a lot of places to deploy capital, where you can go for top-tier non-concessionary returns and unleash huge impact.”
“Even though we’re not concessionary, in this space, the more aggressive you can be, without going bankrupt, on either a quality innovation or an access innovation, you unleash the most impact, but you also unleash the biggest return.”
Learn Capital’s investments
While an extensive list is available at learn.vc/ventures, Greg highlighted a number of the enterprises and their accomplishments.
Nerdy – A leading curated platform for live online learning.
Nerdy is a live learning platform that connects students and professionals with personalised instruction to achieve any goal. Through the company’s free online learning tools, mobile applications, and books, they have created an ecosystem of free practice questions, answers, and explanation sets across hundreds of subjects and standardised tests.
Amplify – The leading publisher of next-generation curriculum and assessment programs.
Amplify provides students and teachers with high-quality, digital-forward instructional programs in Science, Reading, and Math. Amplify currently reaches more than 10 million students in 4,000 districts across all 50 states, with a growing international presence.
New Globe – Supporting visionary governments in the transformation of public education.
NewGlobe supports national and state governments by creating powerful technology-enabled education systems. An education expert and leader in learning, NewGlobe has unequalled experience in dramatically transforming educational outcomes at speed and at scale.
Udemy – The world’s largest marketplace for learning and teaching online.
Udemy is an online learning and teaching content marketplace with on-demand courses from experts in different areas. It offers a consumer product for both learners (Udemy) and teachers (Teach on Udemy), as well as an enterprise product (Udemy for Business).
Coursera – The world’s leading provider of online courses, specialisation tracks, and degrees.
Coursera is a leading MOOC platform that partners with top universities and education institutions around the world to offer courses, certificates, and degrees in a variety of fields. It offers both a consumer product and an enterprise product with curated course selections targeted at employees.
You can contact Learn Capital here www.learn.vc/contact.