Based out of London, Jolt, an edtech startup that offers flexible business school alternatives, has raised a further $14.1 million (approx €12.7 million). The round is led by Balderton Capital with participation from Hillsven Capital and Octopus Ventures. This brings Jolt’s overall funding to €20.9 million.
The company intends to use the funding amount to continue expansion across the UK and Israel and to enter the US market starting with Manhattan. Notably, Jolt operates in three places in London (Shoreditch, Soho, and Liverpool Street) and seven places in Israel.
For the uninitiated, Jolt builds a network of innovative learning spaces where professionals learn together from world-class instructors. According to company claims, its business courses are aimed at young professionals with undergraduate degrees and at least 2 years’ experience, or three years of experience without a degree.
The company was founded by Roei Deutsch, Nitzan Cohen-Arazi, and Nadav Leshem in 2015, who were disillusioned by the current higher education system and falling student numbers.
It is for those who have reached a point in their career where they want to learn new skills, move up the career ladder. This platform offers a self-designed, modular, and pay-as-you-go syllabus with courses taught by global business leaders, including Google, Netflix, and Tesla.
A Jolt NAMBA (“Not An MBA”) program costs £175 (approx €204) a month, or £4,500 (approx €5,250) in total. It’s worth mentioning that this program is six times cheaper than the traditional UK MBAs.
James Wise, the Partner, Balderton Capital, said:
“There is a rapidly increasing demand from both employees and employers for more adaptive forms of professional education. Jolt combines a powerful tech platform with a deep understanding of how people really learn to fulfill this demand, giving the learner complete control over when what and with whom they study. We believe Jolt has the potential to help tens of millions of students, who couldn’t otherwise afford the time or cost of a traditional business school, to gain new skills and meet new people”.
Liat Shtainberg, Head of People Strategy at MagicLab, said:
“The pricing model works well for working professionals as you can freeze your account for a minimal amount if you’re away for a long time or have a particularly busy time at work and the range of courses is quite incredible, whether it’s marketing, finance, product, and personal growth. It offers an all-round curriculum to get you up and running and ready to try your luck in a startup or upskill you to go for new jobs.
Main image picture credits: Jolt
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