Teacher Training Gets a Tech Boost with Opus
Educators looking to maximize the efficiency of their classroom training can now look to Opus, a mobile-first learning platform that provides businesses with a deskless workforce with the tools they need to succeed. The platform, which was co-founded by Rachael Nemeth, Jeffrey Silver, and Vince Li, recently raised $6.8 million in a Series A round led by Stage 2 Capital, with additional investment from Gutter Capital, NextView Ventures, and Bling Capital.
Opus was designed to help businesses with a large distributed workforce improve productivity, minimize labour costs, and increase sales by offering accessible training technology that can be used by 99% of employees. The platform automates the employee training lifecycle and delivers various forms of training to employees’ phones in more than 100 languages.
Commenting on the fundraising, Co-founder & CEO of Opus, Rachael Nemeth said, “Training technology is not accessible to most American workers, but we’re changing that. In today’s labour market, Opus is essential for businesses with frontline workers. We’re building a world where employers are not just checking a box; they are getting frontline business intelligence to make better decisions about their majority workforce. What’s next in the world of work is new knowledge, new growth and creating space for everyone. We’re thrilled to partner with Stage 2 on our next chapter.”
Since its launch in early 2020, the platform has seen success with a number of top food service brands, including Taim, Kevin Hart’s Hart House, Just Salad, Luke’s Lobster, Swingers Golf, Gregory Coffee, Vanderbilt University, and Rhode Island School of Design.
Mandy Cole, Partner of Stage 2 Capital, commented, “The deskless workforce, those that work in restaurants, manufacturing, logistics, and facilities, are the foundation of our economy. The businesses that employ these people must deliver effective training that is accessible and leads to better workplaces. We invested in Opus because the company is trailblazing a training solution for any business with a frontline workforce – something that is lacking in the current market. And we’re excited to join their Board of Directors to help the team scale and make an impact in today’s working world.”
Opus is leveraging AI through its translation technology and content builder. The content builder helps customers take any content, such as a procedure change, and convert it into an interactive lesson 20 times faster than legacy solutions. As a result, their customers have seen a decrease in manager admin time by 40%, while also reducing frontline labour costs by 5%-15%. The platform’s translation technology also helps reduce operating costs by automatically translating every course, message and interaction on the platform into over 100 global languages. By leveraging neural networks for automated translations and a proprietary machine learning model that understands the quality of the system’s translations, the firm achieves 95-99% accuracy.
In addition to the new funding, Opus has also expanded its executive team with Doug Freeman as the Chief Revenue Officer, Frances Liu as VP of Marketing, and Opus’ Co-founder Jeffrey Silver appointed as Chief Technology Officer and Board Director.
With the new funding, Opus is looking to accelerate its growth, including expanding the engineering and go-to-market teams, further developing the SaaS platform, and integrating into new industries. Opus is a great tool for teachers looking to streamline their classroom training and maximize the efficiency of their training.
