More money for MOOCs: Coursera nabs $43M from diverse set of investors

By Ki Mae Heussner. Just last year, online education startup Coursera raised $22 million in venture funding, but the Mountain View-based company is topping up its coffers once again. On Wednesday, the startup said it had raised $43 million in a Series B round of financing from an impressive and interesting group of investors, including education-centric investors GSV Capital and Learn Capital, well-known Russian investor Yuri Milner, the International Finance Corporation (which is the investment arm of the World Bank) and Laureate Education, a for-profit higher education provider formerly known as Sylvan Learning. The funding comes after a year of huge growth – and hype – for the company. In addition to attracting four million students, Coursera said it’s partnered with more than 80 educational institutions worldwide. Beyond that, along with rivals edX and Udacity, the company has sparked considerable interest in (and debate about) massive open online courses (MOOCs) that can educate tens of thousands of students at once. Read more...