The CX Academy, a Dublin-headquartered global provider of online customer experience learning and certification, has raised €1.5 million in new funding. The EIIS Innovation Fund, which provides income tax relief to individual investors in small and medium-sized companies, is investing €1 million, with the balance coming from existing investors.
The CX Academy, which was established by customer experience expert Michael Killeen and online specialist Julian Douglas in 2019, has been supported by Enterprise Ireland from its formation and now employs 11 people. Over the last five years the company has trained more than 5,000 customer experience practitioners across 1,500 leading brands and from more than 90 countries.
Customer experience training is one of the fastest growing sectors in online education amid a high demand for skills. The CX Academy provides online courses and university credit-rated qualifications to all levels of staff from directors to frontline employees, working with companies such as Oracle, Mercedes Benz, Waitrose, Sky, DHL and Lloyds Bank.
“The success of our latest round of fundraising will enable us to fund our ambitious expansion plans and will help us to grow our revenue, particularly through increased marketing and future course development,” said Mr Douglas, who is the company’s chief executive. “We will also be investing in the recruitment of five senior executives and those new hires will enable us to meet our growth targets.”
Brian Devine from the EIIS Innovation Fund, which is managed by Quintus Capital, said the experienced management team and the fact that the company has been profitable since start-up were key factors in the success of the fundraising. “Currently 95 per cent of the CX Academy’s turnover is generated abroad, and we believe the company is ideally placed to tap into the global customer experience online education market and grow its market share in the coming years.”
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