Multiverse raises $220 million Series D at $1.7 billion valuation

Multiverse, a UK-based company that runs professional apprenticeship programs, announced on June 8, 2022 that it had raised $220 million in a Series D funding round. The deal valued the business at $1.7 billion.

StepStone Group led the round alongside returning investors Lightspeed Venture Partners and General Catalyst, which TechCrunch described as co-leads. The new financing brought the total raised by Multiverse to more than $400 million. The company said the money would be used to speed up its expansion in the United States and to widen the range of learning programs it offers, with the aim of giving apprentices more routes to career progression and helping employers close digital skills gaps.

Multiverse works with employers to design apprenticeships and to find candidates for those roles, presenting the model as an alternative to university study and conventional corporate training. At the time of the round it was training apprentices with more than 500 organizations worldwide, including Cisco, Verizon and Box, and reported that its customer base had grown ninefold in two years. Enrollment in its software engineering program was reported to have risen 260% year on year, with a completion rate of more than 85%. It operates from London and New York and was active in nine US cities.