Degreed Acquires Pathgather, Strengthens its Position as the Leading Provider of Learning Experience Platforms

The resulting business has more than 200 clients, over 4 million licensed users, and a revenue run rate in the mid-eight figures.


SAN FRANCISCO, June 20, 2018 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Degreed, the lifelong learning platform, today announced it has acquired Pathgather, merging the two companies that invented the learning experience platform (LXP) category. Terms of the deal, which comes just four months after Degreed appointed its new CEO, Chris McCarthy, were not disclosed.

Uniting these businesses – who are engaged with 40% of the Fortune 500 companies, either as current or potential clients – is a big leap forward on Degreed’s mission to unlock opportunity by creating better ways to build, measure and communicate people’s skills. It also solidifies Degreed’s lead in the fast-growing learning experience platforms market, with a combined client base of more than 200 organizations, over 4 million licensed users, and nearly $100 million in funding.

“This combination makes us the unequivocal leader in learning experience platforms,” said Chris McCarthy, CEO of Degreed. “Corporate learning budgets are shifting fast, and LXPs have emerged as the new operating system for employees’ training and development. Pathgather and Degreed defined this market. Now, together, we have the products, expertise, relationships and war chest we need to triple innovation, and dramatically accelerate our growth.”

With Pathgather, which is highly respected for its customer obsession, engaging user experience and elegant technology, Degreed gets an added boost to its award-winning product, engineering, and client service capabilities. Degreed plans to bring the best elements of both solutions together to create an unequaled experience for both companies’ clients and users.

All of Pathgather’s employees, including founder and CEO Eric Duffy, are joining Degreed, creating the largest team in the industry – over 230 people – dedicated to simplifying learning experiences, and aligning people’s skills to business goals.

“Pathgather has always been dedicated to our customers’ success, and this merger ensures that our users and clients will now enjoy an even better product and experience, with the same level of continued dedication,” said Eric Duffy, CEO of Pathgather. “Joining forces with Degreed plugs us into the biggest and most vibrant community of innovative learning and HR executives in the world. We’re excited to tap into Degreed’s experience, insights and resources.”

“The learner experience is fundamental to learner engagement and knowledge retention, which is why the learning experience market is growing at around 150 to 200 percent per year -- far outpacing the growth of any other category in the corporate learning market,” said Josh Bersin, a recognized industry expert and founder of Bersin(™) by Deloitte. “With its product, sales, and marketing expertise, Degreed has managed to take a clear lead, and this acquisition will likely accelerate its growth.”

Tyton Partners acted as financial advisor to Pathgather in the transaction.

More information about the acquisition is available in this blog post, written by Degreed CEO Chris McCarthy, in this blog post by Pathgather CEO, Eric Duffy, and in this article, “The Learning Experience Market Explodes,” written by industry analyst, Josh Bersin.

About Degreed 
Degreed is a better, smarter way to discover, learn and certify the skills you need for the future. Degreed connects all the resources people use to learn and grow, including corporate learning systems and millions of courses, videos, books, articles, podcasts, and subject experts from thousands of sources. Then we add data science and machine learning to provide people and businesses with the tools, analytics and feedback they need to stay ready for whatever’s next. Founded in 2012, Degreed is headquartered in San Francisco, with additional offices in Salt Lake City and Amsterdam.

Learn more about Degreed at: Website | Facebook | Google+ | YouTube | LinkedIn | Twitter

About Pathgather
Pathgather is the learning experience platform for leading enterprises seeking to stay competitive in a rapidly changing marketplace. It works with existing learning ecosystems to provide actionable learning insights that align employee growth with business goals, and makes it fast and easy for employees, L&D teams, managers and SMEs to create, curate and share learning content. Founded in 2012, Pathgather is headquartered in New York.

Learn more about Pathgather at: Website | LinkedIn | Twitter

Note to editors: Trademarks and registered trademarks remain the property of their respective owners.

Media Contacts:
Jocelyn Shaw
PR Manager, Degreed
jshaw@degreed.com