New York-based education technology company Noodle has acquired Clark, the tutor management business-in-a-box service provider, for an undisclosed amount.
Founded in 2014 by John Katzman, the founder of The Princeton Review and 2U, Noodle makes the process of searching for education better through transparency and efficiency and helps students make decisions about education. It helps students apply to the right programs that meet their needs. The startup connects students with schools, programs, resources, experts and more through its unbiased data and real-world advice.
On the other hand, Clark, founded in 2016 by Megan O’Connor and Sam Gimbel and also based in New York City, works with individual tutors to large scale tutoring agencies, providing services that allow educators to teach more and spend less time on administration. The company claims that it helps tutoring businesses grow by cutting down on admin work by 30%. Clark has conducted over 25k tutoring sessions on its platform since its inception in 2016.
Announcing the news, Clark Co-founders, Megan O’Connor and Sam Gimbel, wrote in a blog post:
“While we’re incredibly proud of our progress so far, there’s still a lot of work to do and opportunity is so massive that we can’t tackle it alone. Today, we’re excited to announce that Clark is being acquired by Noodle, an education studio that is creating new marketplaces to improve how people teach and learn.”
As part of the acquisition, Clark will serve as the backbone for Noodle Pros, a cohort of the world’s most experienced test preparation and academic tutors. With the Clark product and customers serving as a foundation, Noodle Pros can become a network where new personalized learning techniques can be tested and developed at scale.
Noodle will also leverage Clark’s software for its Noodle Pros tutoring businesses, while enabling existing Clark customers to still have access to the same products that they’ve become accustomed to.
With the acquisition, Clark’s shareholders will receive an equity stake in Noodle and O’Connor and her co-founder, Sam Gimbel, will take roles within Noodle to build out a tutoring service within the company. And one of the core components of the new tutoring platform within Noodle will be a focus on the individualization and personalization of tutoring sessions supported by a community of tutors who share information on the most effective teaching strategies for different kinds of learners.
Needless to mention, Noodle has reportedly said to have raised a total of $36.3 million in funding over two rounds and generates about $12.5 million estimated revenue annually.
