Antler Investor Memo Sequence: Monetary coaching startup Nuggets Academy desires to place an finish to ‘dying by PowerPoint’ in skilled improvement

Early stage funding firm Antler Australia just lately backed a brand new cohort of startups as a part of its ongoing program to construct nice native tech firms.

Startup Every day is sharing the small print of every enterprise within the “Antler Investor Memos” sequence, which is designed to provide you a fast,  sharp understanding of the startups and folks concerned, with many looking 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 traders: Antler

Presently elevating: Sure

Description of enterprise

Yearly, finance professionals should undertake dozens of hours of obligatory Persevering with Skilled Growth (CPD) and coaching to ​​keep skilled competency and integrity requirements. 

Not solely is that this usually a painful tick-the-box train, however the coaching supplied by conventional business 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 business with a brand new platform that permits finance professionals to share their experience to be taught collectively and from one another, enabling distinctive dwell 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 crew of greater than 100 staff. Jayride, is now listed on the ASX. 

Collectively, the pair are on a mission to disrupt the best way workforce training is approached, empower finance professionals to reach their careers and eradicate ‘dying by PowerPoint.’

Antler funding thesis

“Nuggets Academy scores extremely throughout crew, product and market,” says Jake Booker, Affiliate Accomplice at Antler Australia. 

“The product is revolutionary, the crew has developed a really clear worth proposition and there’s little or no competitors presently out there. 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 charge of 14.6% each year (CAGR).

“The crew’s traction up to now when it comes to income, natural progress and low churn are robust early indicators in the direction of constructing an impressive platform-led business. We imagine there’s a major alternative for Nuggets Academy with the flexibility 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 dwell occasions have been attended by greater than 4,000 finance professionals and it has attracted greater than 30 instructors who’re presently instructing on the platform. This has seen its ARR triple to greater than $480,000 previously yr 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 crew plans to deal with automating CPD capturing and reporting for the accounting business and standardise operations for working dwell 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 method to do one thing higher, you possibly can guess that we’re engaged on it. 

“We imagine actual change begins with individuals. Whether or not you’re a seasoned practitioner or coach desirous about creating content material, or an skilled skilled searching for a profession with function, our platform permits anybody within the finance business to show with us, share their experience and trade data with different finance professionals. This permits us to scale rapidly and effectively. 

“Our vision is to be the go-to dwell 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 crew.

“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 now have additionally acquired expertise and investor connections by way of the Antler community and group.” 

What’s subsequent?

Antler, a worldwide early-stage VC, is revealing all its newest investments made in bold Australian founders and startups. With over 100 investments in early-stage firms, Tax Nuggets Academy is considered one of its most up-to-date portfolio firms.