Whereas Groupon has become everyone's favorite group-buying whipping boy, Lightbank, the venture capital firm behind it, has remained virtually unassailable. And if co-founders Eric Lefkosky and Brad Keywell stay the course, it's likely to stay that way: The firm announced Wednesday it will give $3 million in financing to Udemy, an online portal that allows anyone to teach a class or register for one online.
“Udemy has become the destination site for experts to share their knowledge online, attracting New York Times bestselling authors, Stanford University lecturers and world-renown speakers to teach courses,” Gagan Biyani, Udemy's president and co-founder said in a press release. “Our new investment will enable us to double down on our efforts to grow our site and expand our worldwide reach.”
If you haven't heard of Udemy, here's a good way to get across its usefulness: Mark Zuckerberg has given a series of lectures on it explaining how you can develop your product to take full advantage of his platform. Not bad, considering Udemy only launched in May 2010.
Keywell also weighed in on the funding, adding, "Udemy has tapped into the proven interest for online learning between individuals and groups of people. Its success shows there is a huge demand for this kind of knowledge transfer."
The money will go towards adding employees to Udemy's marketing and business development teams. You can check out Udemy here.
