Yuan Blair, the son of a former British prime minister, has become one of the richest founders of start-ups in the UK after his education technology company was valued at $ 1.7 billion after the last fundraiser.
Multiverse, which trains and trains apprentices in the United States and the United Kingdom, has raised $ 220 million in additional funding, doubling its estimate eight months ago.
Mr Blair owns 25 to 50 percent of the business, according to Companies House, which estimates his share could be between $ 425 million and $ 850 million.
He founded Multiverse in 2016, when he shared an office with the first few apprentices to make their assessments. The launch began with leaving business cards within walking distance, but has grown rapidly since then, reaching more than 8,000 apprentices.
Multiverse said revenue had grown ninefold in two years, although it declined to give figures.
In a post on LinkedIn, Blair said that completing the funding round now “is not something we set out to do.”
He added: “We raised record amounts twice in 2021. In the end, I’m firmly convinced of raising a lot before you think you might need it. Building an exclusive alternative to the university is no small feat. “
His father, Sir Tony Blair, was a strong advocate of university degrees when he was prime minister, aiming for half of school leavers to go to university.
The Multiverse funding round was led by existing investors Lightspeed Venture Partners and General Catalyst, along with new investors StepStone Group and Founders Circle Capital. Other existing investors also participated, including BOND, D1 Capital Partners, GV, Index Ventures and Audacious Ventures.
Mr Blair said the new money would be used to continue expansion in the United States and the United Kingdom. Multiverse can offer services to 100,000 apprentices each year, he said. The company employs more than 600 people, most of them in the United Kingdom.
The group provides appraisal and apprenticeship, along with personalized training and access to people in their first career or transition to digital, technology and information jobs at various stages of their lives.
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He has trained professional apprentices with more than 500 organizations worldwide, including Cisco, Verizon, Visa and Box in the United States. Of the apprentices Multiverse has hired worldwide, 56 percent are people of color, more than half are women, and 34 percent come from low-income communities.
“One of the things that’s so broken in the current system is that he’s trying to pretend that a three- or four-year bachelor’s degree is enough to take you through a career of a few decades,” Blair said.
“We will not make the same mistake with apprenticeships. Our vision is for a system in which people can return to apprenticeships when they need to level their careers.
Youngme Moon, a professor at Harvard Business School and director of companies including Unilever and Mastercard, has been appointed to the company’s board.
“This will involve huge investments in technology,” Blair said. “When you think of some of the great challenges societies are facing right now – declining higher education enrollment, rising student debt, inertia over racial equality, opportunities less evenly distributed than talent, great reconciliation and global skills shortages,” none of the existing solutions was enough. “
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