2020 USA
EdTech Trade Mission

This trade mission suits companies that are ready to learn more about the potential for growth in the US EdTech Market.

• The US is a potential market for expansion outside Australia
• To better understand how your company fits in the Global EdTech environment
• Already have a few customers from the US organically and would like to be more strategic about growing this market
• Looking to seek investment through US capital markets

Ben Bungert is the Director of Operations for LearnLaunch Accelerator and in addition to his role on the management team, focuses operationally on identifying, selecting, and supporting early stage edtech companies through LearnLaunch’s various educational programs.

Prior to LearnLaunch Accelerator, Ben built educational and experiential learning programs at the New England Venture Capital Association focused on talent development and retention in Massachusetts. Before getting into the startup and investing world, Ben held sales, marketing, and operations roles at several companies, including Education First, Fiksu, and CloudLock.

Named one of the “Most Innovative People in Higher Education” by  Washington Monthly, Bridget Burns is the founding Executive Director of the University Innovation Alliance (UIA). The UIA is the ground-breaking national consortium of public research universities working together to test and scale innovations that close achievement gaps and improve outcomes for all students. Since its founding in 2014, the UIA campuses have increased their low-income degrees awarded by 32% (producing over 30,000 additional low-income graduates to date) and increased graduates of color by 56%. The Alliance has been featured in national outlets like  60 Minutes, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Fast Company, and in the documentary “Unlikely”. The UIA has inspired and supported the formation of more than 15 other university networks working to improve postsecondary success for low-income students.

 For the past decade, Bridget has advised university presidents, system chancellors, and state and federal policy leaders on strategies to expand access to higher education, address costs, and promote completion for students of all backgrounds. She is a former university system chief of staff, state higher education senior policy advisor, higher education governing board member, and American Council on Education fellow. Bridget is a strong believer in the transformative power of higher education.

Fernando Valenzuela Migoya is a recognized leader in Latin America, and a specialist in digital transformation processes. He was recently linked as one of the 100 top influencers on EdTech in the world by EdTech Digest Magazine. Throughout his 30-year professional career, Valenzuela has held relevant global executive positions. He has currently consolidated a platform of projects aimed at transforming education in Latin America. He heads the Education program of the Aspen Institute Mexico. He is a partner of EDTPartners and founder of the Global Edtech Impact Alliance, dedicated to the study of educational ventures and global trends in educational transformation. Fernando Valenzuela Migoya studied his bachelor in computer science from the Universidad Iberoamericana. He received an MBA international business from the University of Miami and was a Wharton Fellow.

For over 20 years, Ian has been an investor, entrepreneur, and advisor to education and technology companies. He has a deep global network in the education sector and brings a wealth of investing and board experience to the Owl Ventures team. Ian serves on the boards of Degreed, BenchPrep, LeLe Ketang, Sanjieke, and Abl and works closely with MasterClass. Prior to joining Owl Ventures, Ian led the education sector at Warburg Pincus and was a technology investor at Silver Lake Partners. Earlier in his career, Ian was a consultant at Bain & Company and also helped launch BigMachines, a SaaS company that was acquired by Oracle. Ian serves on the Advisory Board for SEO, a non-profit that provides educational, career, and mentoring programs for young people from underrepresented communities. He is a member of the Advisory Council for Gladeo, a digital social enterprise dedicated to providing career guidance to 

underserved youth of diverse backgrounds. Ian was also the lead author of Caution: Watch for Scholarships Ahead, a practical guide for students to navigate the complex scholarship application process, which was endorsed by Stanford University’s Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid.

In addition, Ms. Spero did outreach work for NetDay/ Project Tomorrow. Ms. Spero holds a BA from Bryn Mawr College in Political Science and MA in Public Law from Columbia University. She serves on the Board of the National Coalition for Technology in Education and Training and was a past President. She is active in a wide range of community activities in the Washington, DC area.

Jean is an active angel investor focusing on early stage high tech start-ups. She was honoured with the highest award for angels in the US, the Hans Severiens Award in 2014. She was a founder of the Boston branch of Golden Seeds (focused on investing in women-managed businesses) and a member of Launchpad Venture Group and Hub Angels. Jean is an active angel investor focusing on early stage high tech start-ups. She was honoured with the highest award for angels in the US, the Hans Severiens Award in 2014. She was a founder of the Boston branch of Golden Seeds (focused on investing in women-managed businesses) and a member of Launchpad Venture Group and Hub Angels. She has played an active board level role with a number of her Boston area investments including Crimson Hexagon, Hire Reach, Home Portfolio, Instream Media, iTeam, Peach Underneath, Pixibility, Playrific, Ten Marks, ZipCar, and a number of others. Her activities with nonprofits include being on the board of The Capital Network.

Josh is Education Director for SEEK, an Australian-born global pioneer in online employment and education, with a US$5BN+ market capitalization. Josh and his team have in the past 15 years placed SEEK at the forefront of edtech investment globally. Examples include establishing Australia’s largest online university platform business (Online Education Services or OES), leading Coursera’s latest investment round, acquiring 50% of FutureLearn (in Europe’s largest ever edtech deal) and partnering with a US non-profit university to deliver US degrees to Latin America online in Spanish. He currently serves on the Boards of education businesses across 4 continents including OES (Australia), UTEL (Mexico), Avenu (US) and Caelum (Brazil).

Mathew is disrupting the higher education landscape, creating some of the industry’s most innovative educational platforms and projects. He is a regular media contributor on topics of business, innovation and entrepreneurship, including articles in Wealth Creator, Marketing Magazine, Business First, Smart Magazine, Start-Up Smart and Business Builders. As a thought leader on innovation within education, Mat has hosted and spoken at numerous academic and business events including chairing the 2014 ADC Forum Summit on ‘the Future of Australian Higher Education’, Harvard University, and Startup Grind. Mat is also on the Victorian Education Ministerial Advisory Roundtable. As founder of the Ducere Foundation, fully funded by Ducere, Mat works in close partnerships with sovereign states, major universities, philanthropic leaders and major businesses to deliver educational programs across 12 African countries. The Foundation currently employs 55 full time staff in Africa.

pedagogy in Pennsylvania’s 622 high schools through connected classrooms and one-to-one computing environments. He is a proud product of the Pennsylvania public school system. Dr. Golden next served as Senior Vice President at Pearson, where he led the planning and administrative functions for Pearson’s U.S. education division, including strategy, marketing, business development, and research. He then became Corporate Vice President of Education at Microsoft. In this role, he directed the development and execution of Microsoft’s global efforts in education across the company.

Rita Ferrandino has built an international reputation as one of the most effective strategist and coalition-builders in the education entrepreneurship community. She is a recognized STEM education expert and authority on education policy and politics. Rita is the founding partner at Arc Capital Development, a global private investment and advisory firm. Arc invests in, operates and advises companies in the K-20 education and corporate training markets and has served over 125 clients in the US, Australia, Canada, Mexico, Singapore, Hong Kong, China, Ireland, Turkey, Israel &; India. Arc clients and portfolio companies provide products generating over a billion dollars a year to schools worldwide. Rita’s career highlights include being salesperson of the year at Pearson Education for three consecutive years, selling more than $178 million of products to the higher education and K-12 markets, leading the acquisition effort for more than 50 STEM 

titles, and forming revenue-producing alliances with more than a dozen of the industry’s largest publishers and distributors. She has been responsible for double-digit sales growth for at least six years at two different major publishers. Rita currently serves as an Instructor at the University of Pennsylvania in Entrepreneurship and has an appointment at the Catalyst@PennGSE Innovation Center. For three years, she was President of the Education Design Studio Inc Incubator funded in collaboration with the Milken Foundation &; University of Pennsylvania.

Tara is passionate about innovation in global higher education. She founded Qalibrates to provide comprehensive digital education visibility from degrees to micro-credentials and short courses addressing the ever-widening skills gap. Sage Education Marketing’s portfolio of forging global, scalable strategies partnerships include Dublin City University, FutureLearn, OES, KeyPath, 2U, Academic Partnerships. Laureate QuinStreet, and the US government.