Dunce Deals #20 - Omella, Envoys, Edgi, Remnote
Hi, I'm John Danner, Managing Director of Dunce Capital. Dunce Deals is my look at the most interesting deals and news from edtech and the future of work. In the last four years, I have made over two dozen pre-seed investments in the space including Lambda School, where I am on the board, Outschool, Maven and GetSetup. Before Dunce, I founded three companies, NetGravity (IPO), Rocketship Public Schools (12k students) and Zeal (sold 2018).
Thoughts
Peak market is a great time in many ways, but brings with it hazards. One is the bombardment of founders with inbound inquiries from investors. I have a contrarian point of view on this which I write about in Continuous Inbound Fundraising. Next week, I will write about the things I see founders do when they are being showered with money, titled ‘Don’t Let Your Investors Fool You’.
Oh, and this covid thing. Fuhgeddaboudit, at least here in Palo Alto. I’m going back to school next year at Stanford through their DCI program, and we have started our orientation. Every week, happy hour doubles in attendees, twenty this week on my back patio. Let’s hope that being fully vaccinated and outdoors is as safe as it feels.
News
Maven is hiring up a storm. In my opinion, this is going to be one of the defining companies in modern education, making upskilling awesome in cohort based courses. If you know someone that has always wanted to be in edtech, this is a good bet. This is Wes Kao’s organization, who in my opinion knows more about cohort based courses than anyone on the planet.
Deals
Omella
Description: The easiest way to accept payments and paperwork for your school.
Website: omella.com
Founder: Brett Kopf
Email: brett@omella.com
Stage: Seed
Raising: No
Current Dunce Investment: Yes
Notes: Brett was the co-founder and CEO of Remind. Omella is his next company.
Envoys
Description: Online experiential programs exposing students to interesting places around the world.
Website: envoys.com
Founder: Felipe Correa
Email: fcorrea@envoys.com
Stage: Seed
Raising: Yes
Current Dunce Investment: No
Deck: https://envoysx.docsend.com/view/3i8r83j869gwyiky
Notes: I have looked at a lot of online experiential programs over the past few years. Envoys has huge potential. They did physical experientials in the past, mostly for elite schools. Now online, they are able to make them very affordable for students. They are still figuring out their go to market, but a combination of rich digital content and live experiences for students is pretty compelling.
Edgi
Description: A live forum for students to discuss and debate hard questions
Website: edgilearning.com
Founder: Josh Shapiro
Email: josh@edgilearning.com
Stage: Seed
Raising: Yes
Current Dunce Investment: No
Notes: This was an impressive pitch on edpitches this week. As live instruction goes mainstream, more and more interesting approaches keep surfacing. Josh is a NYU professor and runs essentially cohort-based-courses for students on Edgi. Definitely worth checking out.
Remnote
Description: Notion for students
Website: remnote.io
Founder: Martin Schneider
Email: martin.franz.schneider@gmail.com
Stage: Seed
Raising: Yes
Current Dunce Investment: No
Notes: I haven’t spent a ton of time on note taking and quiz software, but want to spend more. Remnote is basically notion for students with some nice shortcuts for studying and sharing. It’s pretty slick and they are currently selling 2/3 to students and 1/3 to employees. So who knows where this goes. It shares that wonderful growth loop of inviting other people to your projects that has grown Notion, Roam, Figma, Padlet so effectively.
Here is the complete list of Dunce Investments:
Mystery Science - purchased by Discovery Education 2020
Swing - on-demand talent for the education market
Epic! - the best children’s books digitally for every classroom and every home
Kunduz - the leader in test prep for Turkey
Erudifi - loans for students going to vocational schools and higher ed in SE Asia.
Outschool - the best marketplace of live small classes for your k-12 student
Juni - Coding, Math, and English instruction 1-1 and small group
Lambda School - teaching students to code and get jobs in great companies
LingoKids - English learning for young children
Padlet - a modern document creation and sharing platform
TinyCare - micro-daycare centers
SV Academy - teaching students tech sales and getting them jobs in great companies
Sora - a better high school, completely online
Prenda - micro-schools to unlock your child’s talent
Galileo - the first online world school
Beanstalk - live classes for young children
GetSetup - live social network for seniors
Primer - live academic and social network for homeschoolers
Contra - social network for freelancers
Fourthrev - run digital bootcamps for universities focused on in-demand job skills
Marketerhire - marketing experts from that you can rent
Abwaab - the best test prep platform in MENA
Supernow - live classes and clubs for elementary and middle schoolers
Maven - the leader in cohort-based courses
Prendea - live classes and social network for students in LatAm
Kritik - peer grading for higher ed
Major League Hacking - hackathons and fellowships for university students
Reforge - live classes on Growth for upskilling professionals
Synthesis School - learn problem-solving by playing video games
AI Camp - AI for ages 13-18 from Stanford pHDs.
Bindr - Silent study groups online.