Early stage funding firm Antler Australia not too long ago backed a brand new cohort of startups as a part of its ongoing program to construct nice native tech corporations.
Startup Day by day is sharing the main points of every enterprise within the “Antler Investor Memos” collection, which is designed to offer you a fast, sharp understanding of the startups and folks concerned, with many searching for observe up capital following Antler’s preliminary pre-seed funding.
Firm identify: Nuggets Academy
Formation date: 2022
Stage of enterprise: Pre-Seed
Founders: Joyce Ong and Ross Lin
Present buyers: Antler
Presently elevating: Sure
Description of enterprise
Yearly, finance professionals should undertake dozens of hours of necessary Persevering with Skilled Improvement (CPD) and coaching to preserve skilled competency and integrity requirements.
Not solely is that this typically a painful tick-the-box train, however the coaching supplied by conventional trade our bodies is taken into account by many stale and costly, offering inaccessible and dated studying experiences, whereas different comparative studying platforms lack the depth and perception required for such experience subject material.
Nuggets Academy is pioneering change within the trade with a brand new platform that enables finance professionals to share their experience to be taught collectively and from one another, enabling distinctive stay studying experiences.
Main this enterprise are Joyce Ong and her co-founder Ross Lin. Joyce is a tax specialist and previously the ATO’s Nationwide Tax Governance Lead. Ross is a tech and product guru and former startup founder.
Previous to Nuggets Academy, Ross based Jayride, for which he raised $15 million in funding and scaled to a workforce of greater than 100 staff. Jayride, is now listed on the ASX.
Collectively, the pair are on a mission to disrupt the way in which workforce schooling is approached, empower finance professionals to reach their careers and eradicate ‘dying by PowerPoint.’
Antler funding thesis
“Nuggets Academy scores extremely throughout workforce, product and market,” says Jake Booker, Affiliate Accomplice at Antler Australia.
“The product is modern, the workforce has developed a really clear worth proposition and there may be little or no competitors at the moment available in the market. Together with that, the worldwide finance CPD market is estimated to be $20+ billion in western English-speaking nations alone with on-line studying rising at a speedy price of 14.6% every year (CAGR).
“The workforce’s traction up to now when it comes to income, natural development and low churn are robust early indicators in the direction of constructing an impressive platform-led business. We consider there’s a major alternative for Nuggets Academy with the power to scale virally.”
Traction/ milestones, up to now
Because it launched in February 2022, Nuggets Academy has attracted greater than 700 paid subscribers and greater than 50 groups. Together with that, its stay occasions have been attended by greater than 4,000 finance professionals and it has attracted greater than 30 instructors who’re at the moment instructing on the platform. This has seen its ARR triple to greater than $480,000 prior to now 12 months alone.
Newest funding
Pre-Seed from Antler.
Use of funds
Antler Australia’s preliminary funding will allow Nuggets Academy to proceed to validate its enterprise mannequin, discover product market match and construct out its MVP. Specifically, the workforce plans to concentrate on automating CPD capturing and reporting for the accounting trade and standardise operations for working stay digital occasions for future scaling.
The founders say
“At Nuggets Academy, we’re by no means glad with the established order,” says Joyce. “If there’s a approach to do one thing higher, you may guess that we’re engaged on it.
“We consider actual change begins with folks. Whether or not you’re a seasoned practitioner or coach fascinated about creating content material, or an skilled skilled on the lookout for a profession with function, our platform permits anybody within the finance trade to show with us, share their experience and change data with different finance professionals. This permits us to scale shortly and effectively.
“Our vision is to be the go-to stay studying platform for finance professionals. Up to now, we’ve discovered product-market match inside the finance Edtech house; and have clear know-how to scale this because of our robust founding workforce.
“Antler has additionally supplied invaluable mentoring and steerage on fundraising for our subsequent spherical, in addition to credibility which is essential within the finance career. We have now additionally acquired expertise and investor connections by means of the Antler community and neighborhood.”
What’s subsequent?
Antler, a worldwide early-stage VC, is revealing all its newest investments made in formidable Australian founders and startups. With over 100 investments in early-stage corporations, Tax Nuggets Academy is certainly one of its most up-to-date portfolio corporations.