IMPACTASSETS 50™
An Annual Showcase of Impact Investment Fund Managers
ImpactAssets 50
An Annual Showcase of Impact Investment Fund Managers
LearnLaunch Fund III L.P.
Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
EducationFirm Overview
LearnLaunch Fund+Accelerator is a venture capital fund and accelerator that invests in and supports entrepreneurs on the mission to transform education positively. Since our inception in 2013, we have invested in 71 companies, of which 66% are run by female and/or BIPOC entrepreneurs. Our portfolio entrepreneurs drive access, equity, and outcomes in K12, higher education, workforce development, and life-long upskilling. To date, our portfolio companies have impacted 18+ million learners globally. Our first two micro-funds (LearnLaunchX & LearnLaunch Accelerator II) under the brand name LearnLaunch Accelerator evolved around the accelerator model, offering an 8-10 week concentrated training program and investment in exchange for equity. Fund III will operate under the name LearnLaunch Fund+Accelerator. The $8-10m fund will continue running the accelerator as the primary portfolio support vehicle. About one-third of the capital will be reserved for discretionary deal-by-deal investment in companies not participating in the accelerator.
Years of Operation: 5 – 9 years
% of Capital from Top 3 Investors: 25% – 49%
LearnLaunch Fund+Accelerator will make direct investments into education technology startups building innovative products to improve equity and access in education across the K12, higher education, and workforce upskilling.
We identified several opportunity areas overarching K-12, Higher Ed, and Workforce Training markets. (1) New Learning Environments & Approaches; (2) Skills & Competency-Based Learning; (3) Consumer & Enterprise Solutions (4) Data, Analytics, and Personalization. The majority of the portfolio companies will be participants in the accelerator program. The "accelerator method" allows us to get to know the executive teams and product offerings thoroughly, further mitigating against investment downside. This will be complemented with a deal-by-deal opportunistic investment with similar profiled companies. Our core geographic focus will be North America, mostly US. We will consider a small number of international companies expanding to North America or having hyper growth potential in respective local markets. We believe that diverse innovators should drive change in the education system. We aim to invest in a diverse group of entrepreneurs building truly accessible and effective educational solutions.
The LearnLaunch brand has grown into distinction as one of the most active pre-seed stage edtech investors since 2013. Through our experience with two accelerator-funds, we developed rigorous curation and acceleration methods that allow us to spot innovator’s on-the-move and provide them with the resources they need to progress to the next level. We have deep expertise in building market-informed scaling strategies and finding stage-appropriate funding pathways. We leverage a proprietary network of 160 mentors who cover multiple disciplines in education and business to help our companies achieve significant growth milestones. In addition, we help curate opportunities for mergers, acquisitions, and follow-on funding with whom our companies have raised ancillary investments of $165M+. We are committed to supporting diverse entrepreneurs and creating unbiased and nondiscriminatory experiences for our portfolio companies. Historically, our allocations of funds match our portfolio ethnic and demographic data, giving our founders equal opportunities.
Investment Example
CareAcademy is upskilling and preparing workers in eldercare and home care. CareAcademy’s platform focuses on caregiver training, onboarding, and compliance management. We invested in CareAcademy when the company had about 5 FTEs, 30 paying customers and a library of 50 videos hosted on a third-party platform. Our investment thesis was driven by a combination of market trends (growing demand for direct care workers, high turnover and need for upskilling) and a team of two incredibly committed female entrepreneurs. Furthermore, the long-term goal of providing career pathways for the underserved, largely female and BIPOC workers in this role was compelling. We supported the team with the analysis of market segments, product roadmap design and diligence for the first institutional funding round. Today, CareAcademy is serving 300+ clients and provides a sophisticated technology platform including career pathways to thousands of direct care professionals who need this product with even more urgency post-COVID.
Leadership and Team
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Jean Hammond – General Partner More Info
Jean is a serial tech entrepreneur turned active angel investor, and a member of Launchpad Venture Group, Hub Angels, and Golden Seeds (co-founding the Boston forum), which focuses on investments in women-owned or managed businesses. She is a recipient of the Hans Severiens Award, the highest award for U.S. angel investors based on her huge impact on growing investment in women and women’s participation as angels. She has helped build a number of entrepreneurial support organizations. Jean is a highly respected speaker on entrepreneurship and education system chance. She co-founded LearnLaunch Accelerator and related organizations. A prolific investor, she has served on the board (or as a board-level advisor) to over 50 startups over time. At MIT where she received her MS she serves on the Sloan North American Executive Board, MIT Corporation (Board) and the Trust Center. |
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Tetyana Astashkina – General Partner More Info
I am in charge of managing all aspects of day-to-day business of the Accelerator including portfolio development, fundraising, and investors relations. Prior to LearnLaunch I was a Principal with Europe’s most active angel network and a group of funds btov Partners. I led btov’s activities in international markets and co-managed fund operations. My past investments covered a broad spectrum of themes including clean technologies (e.g. wind tech, bio tech, renewable energies) and internet-enabled consumer-facing businesses (e.g. travel, fashion, e-health). |
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Matthew J. Rubins – General Partner More Info
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Financial Performance
Impact Performance
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Percentage of Total Assets Under
Management that are Impact Investments: |
100%
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All the companies we have selected and plan to select are focused on education, workforce training, skilling and upskilling. We only choose companies that: 1) improve equitable access to education, 2) allow institutions to improve delivery of education services, and/or provide products designed to improve learning. In addition, we believe that education technology (e.g. on-line classes or enabling software) is one of the ways to bring improved learning capabilities to underserved regions (e.g. rural areas). With our expertise in the early stage investing, we can provide deep industry-aware support to innovators emerging from and representing the populations being poorly served by the education system today. All the portfolio and expected investees address changes in a way that fundamentally addresses, at least, more equitable access to education.
Underrepresented populations have and continue to be poorly served by our educational system. We believe that change in education should be driven by diverse innovators from the most vulnerable populations. We need a new, more representative cadre of entrepreneurs to build sustainable solutions that effectuate lasting impact. Our investment criteria include an assessment of the leadership team’s diversity composition. Sixty-six percent of our past investments are in companies founded by people who identify as women or people who identify as historically and traditionally underserved founders. Further, our investment model includes milestones-based follow-on funding. Evaluation for follow-on funding is comprehensive of achieving certain predefined business and impact milestones. Depending on the situation, impact milestones may require building a more inclusive team.
Impact Tracking and Monitoring
Learn More
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