Coursera, the world's leading online education provider, announced that it raised almost $50 million in funding for their expansion plans to China, the Americas and India.
The leading provider of the funding was New Enterprise Associates. Other participants included Times Internet Limited, International Finance Corporation, and Kleiner Perkins.
Coursera claims to have 15 million users and provides 1,100 courses. A million of their users are located in China and 50 percent of Coursera's students are looking for opportunities to develop new skills for the sake of advancing their careers.
Because of its rapid global expansion, the company has sought the help of financial partners. One of the company's plans is to widen its course offerings.
India and China come with the most number of Coursera users with a million each. Brazil and Latin America are also avid users of the course provider. Ninety percent of its staff is in Silicon Valley.
Most of the funds raised for the expansion will go into innovation of their product services. Coursera CEO, Rick Levin, said that the company is looking for ways to continuously improve their products. Although he believes that its platform is the best of its kind, he also recognized that is needs improvements in providing better learner interactions and assessments.
Levin also plans to incorporate other ways that the company can make profits. Coursera has just introduced their paid multi-course specialization programs aimed for those who are employed but what to improve their technical and business skills. Among Levin's plans is to add more specialization courses soon and is looking at the possibility of working with industry partners in order to design these courses.
Levin further said that he would like to see people learn and develop their career through Coursera and in order to do this, they have the determination to create and provide the best learning experience they can have.
At the present, the company has already raised $135 million.
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