Coursera

Coursera

Coursera was founded by Stanford professors Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller, who launched the platform in 2012 to deliver university courses online. The company went public on the NYSE in 2021 under the ticker COUR. It operates as a for-profit public benefit corporation, balancing shareholder returns with a social mission to expand access to education. The platform partners with 350+ universities and companies—including Google, IBM, Meta, and Stanford—to offer courses, Specializations, Professional Certificates, and online degrees. Coursera generates revenue primarily through individual subscriptions (Coursera Plus), course and certificate fees, and enterprise contracts through Coursera for Business. The company also serves government and nonprofit clients, with operations in North America, India, and Singapore. Coursera reported 197 million registered learners across 230+ countries as of 2025. The firm employs a global team across offices in Mountain View, New Delhi, and Singapore. In recent months, Coursera announced a merger with Udemy, forming a combined company under the Coursera name, aimed at scaling enterprise and consumer learning offerings. The company maintains a B Corp certification alongside its public benefit corporation status. Coursera’s structural differentiator is its hybrid governance: it is a publicly traded company legally required to pursue a social mission, verified annually by B Corp standards. This separates it from both traditional edtech firms and from family offices or investment managers—it holds no external capital for deployment and operates as an operating company, not an allocator.