Dive Temporary:
- Ocelot, a texting and chatbot firm for increased schooling establishments, introduced Wednesday that it has raised $117 million from K1 Funding Administration, which focuses on funding software program corporations.
- Earlier than K1’s funding, Ocelot had not taken exterior funding. The funding shall be used to gas development, develop new companies for faculties and enhance current merchandise.
- The funding comes a couple of years after Ocelot pivoted towards utilizing synthetic intelligence to create chatbots and texting companies for college students. Earlier than that, Ocelot bought its begin by creating monetary assist publications and movies for faculties.
Dive Perception:
The massive funding comes at a time when ed tech funding is slowing down. Ed tech corporations are anticipated to complete the yr with round $17.4 billion in enterprise funding, down from about $20.8 billion final yr, in line with a latest estimate from HolonIQ, a market evaluation agency.
“K1 has deep expertise investing in EdTech and we’re empathetic to what universities and college students skilled throughout pandemic-related shutdowns the previous few years,” Brian Beard, vp at K1, stated in an emailed assertion. “We strongly imagine in supporting as many college students as doable and Ocelot’s platform allows all college students to navigate college techniques.”
Ocelot has shifted its focus all through its twenty years. At the moment, the corporate is concentrated on texting and chatbot companies powered by AI. Faculties can use the corporate’s platform in a number of methods, together with informing college students about their monetary assist choices, contacting them about essential deadlines or connecting them to reside advisers.
The platform gives two-way texting with college students, together with chatbots that combine with faculty techniques. The corporate counts greater than 500 establishments as purchasers, together with the College of Florida and the College of California, Los Angeles.
“We’re pleased with how we have now grown prior to now 20 years to turn out to be a communications chief and a platform, and it’s labored very nicely,” stated Talin Andonians, Ocelot’s CEO. “We’ve been capable of gas our development with our personal inside money circulate. This funding permits us to speed up that development.”
Ocelot is already centered on scholar assist, together with monetary assist, enrollment and admissions. However Andonians stated there may be extra work to do “throughout the coed lifecycle.”
The funding comes at a time when enrollment is falling throughout increased schooling. The variety of college students taking lessons has fallen round 7.4% because the pandemic started, representing about 1.3 million individuals, in line with the most recent figures from the Nationwide Scholar Clearinghouse Analysis Heart.
“The ache continues to exist, and we’ll want extra innovation sooner or later,” Andonians stated. “We’re positioned very well to do this and to proceed to serve the market.”
