SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Udacity, the global lifelong learning platform, announced today the appointment of Gabriel Dalporto as the company’s new Chief Executive Officer.
Dalporto joins Udacity from LendingTree, where he served in several leadership roles throughout his seven-year tenure, including Chief Marketing Officer and Chief Financial Officer. During his time at LendingTree, he was instrumental in driving the company’s transition from a microcap, mortgage-focused marketplace to a multi-billion dollar, fully diversified financial services marketplace. During his tenure, LendingTree delivered a remarkable 6745% stock price appreciation, one of the highest of any publicly traded company. Dalporto joined the LendingTree Board in 2017 and continues to be an active board member.
“What drew me to Udacity is the ability to help millions of people advance and thrive in their careers on a worldwide scale,” said Dalporto. “Technological advancements are creating enormous efficiency gains while fundamentally changing the skills required for workers to succeed and flourish in their careers — and that’s where Udacity has a window to change the world for the better and at meaningful scale.”
Dalporto’s appointment comes on the heels of a record-setting year. Udacity’s enterprise business has experienced more than 150% growth in revenue in the first six months of 2019, driven by dozens of new Fortune Global 500 enterprise customers and record customer retention rates. Udacity’s consumer business has grown by more than 60% since the company launched its subscription model and global technical mentoring program in May 2019. On top of this, Udacity has been cashflow positive since June. Last week, Udacity granted its 100,000th Nanodegree certificate and is about to cross more than a million successful project submissions.
“Our future is bright and we are excited about the next chapter,” said Sebastian Thrun, Founder, President, and Executive Chairman of Udacity. “With Gabe’s dynamic leadership style and outcome-driven approach, I know he is the right person to lead Udacity into our next phase of growth. And I will continue to support Gabe and the company as Executive Chairman of Udacity.”
About Udacity
Udacity is a global, online lifelong learning platform connecting education to jobs and providing students with skills to advance careers. Udacity Nanodegree programs provide credentials earned through a series of online courses and projects from self-driving cars to digital marketing. Udacity collaborates with expert instructors and over 200 global industry partners including AT&T, Google, Facebook, Mercedes-Benz and NVIDIA to power careers through tech education. Headquartered in Mountain View, Calif., the privately-funded company has operations in China, Egypt, Germany, India and the United Arab Emirates. Its investors include Bertelsmann, Andreessen Horowitz, Charles River Ventures and Drive Capital. For more information, please visit www.udacity.com.