Dive Brief:
- Colombian online learning company Platzi is one of the tech startups chosen for Y Combinator’s latest incubation round.
- TechCrunch reports the two-year-old company is already making money offering skills-based classes in Spanish to highly engaged students, but it sought out Y Combinator support to expand through Silicon Valley into the English-speaking world.
- Platzi has 80,000 registered users so far and boasts a 70% completion rate for its online courses, which are taught by industry leaders rather than career academics, TechCrunch reports.
Dive Insight:
Platzi will be one of the more stable Y Combinator startups, but its founders will arrive to Silicon Valley for their three-month incubation period with the company’s U.S. market still largely untapped. As far as online courses go, Platzi’s may not be the largest but completion rates are impressively high. So far, its services have offered Spanish-speakers a chance to develop tech skills remotely from industry experts and its model has been very well-received. According to TechCrunch, Platzi founders are focused on aggressive expansion through English-speaking markets. They already are offering a number of English-language classes at no charge, though free classes are temporary to encourage enrollment. Future classes by Silicon Valley tech experts are sure to be in the works soon.