The Greek course creation and e-learning marketplace LearnWorlds, closed a $32M funding round from the US venture capital firm Insight Partners to boost its roadmap and accelerate customer success efforts. As part of the investment deal, the Managing Partner of Insight, Nikitas Koutoupes, and the Principal of the fund, Boris Treskunov will join the board of the e-learning company.
Founded by Panos Siozos, Fanis Despotakis, and Giorgos Palaigeorgiou in 2014, LearnWorlds has a mission to democratize direct-to-consumer online learning and make it possible for creators of educational content to easily monetize their knowledge.
The all-in-one e-learning creation and monetization tool
The cloud-based, white-label, and no-code platform of LearnWorlds allows teachers and educational organizations to create online courses and sell them online without having any special IT skills. It works as an online school with classes that can be sold through the personal website of the creators. Besides teaching purposes, LearnWorlds is also used for professional training by companies that educate their remote workers.
The platform of LearnWorlds is user-friendly, allows for precise content authoring, and offers a customizable website builder, which means that it can provide value for educators, developers, and designers.
The growth path and future plans of LearnWorlds
Siozos has shared that during the pandemic, demand for the services of LearnWorld almost tripled and it has been upwards ever since then as users were looking to upskill themselves and use wisely the time they spent at their homes. As a result, the company enjoyed a 300% growth during the past years.
As of now, LearnWorlds has over 4.4K users in more than 120 countries with the biggest percentage of customers coming from the US. In addition to its headquarters in Cyprus, LearnWorlds has offices in the Greek cities Limassol and Chania, but over 90% of the 80-member team is fully remote. With the latest funding, the company plans to double the number of its current employees and reach 170 full-time employees in 2022 by hiring more international talent beyond Greece. Other short-term goals include boosting marketing and sales efforts and targeting more SMEs internationally.
Swimming alongside the big fish
Even though the three founders had a strong academic background and little go-to-market experience, they managed to bootstrap their development and use organic growth before securing their first $1.2M from the Greek Marathon Venture Capital. In terms of the latest round, besides the significant amount of the raised funds, the fact that LearnWorlds has managed to secure an investment from Insight Partners is a business recognition itself.
The portfolio of the US venture capital firm includes companies such as DocuSign, Shopify, Udemy, and Twitter. According to Koutoupes, the cloud-based learning management system of LearnWorlds allows for the creation of a high-quality, interactive, and branded e-learning experience that results in a positive learning outcome for its users.
