One of Toba’s home run early tech investments, Irvine’s Alteryx, also has a keen interest in teaching. Last week, the $5 billion-valued software firm unveiled a new online education program, SparkED, designed for learners at all skill levels to gain hands-on experience and certification in data analytics.
Educators, students and life-long learners can access training, Alteryx software and certifications—at no cost—to “achieve data science skills and bolster their résumé,” the company said.
“We know that there is a shortage of people globally with real data analytics skills,” Libby Duane Adams, Alteryx’s co-founder and chief advocacy officer, told our Kevin Costelloe. “We have a responsibility to make sure that there is more talent in the marketplace.”
How much talent is out there?
“We want to move a million learners globally through this program by the end of 2023,” said Adams, who last year earned a Women in Business Award from the Business Journal.
It’s not the company’s first stab at an educational program; last year it offered free data analytics training to those who lost their jobs early on in the pandemic.
Adams said she expects the SparkED learners to range from anyone from a ninth grader excited about data to “a 45-year-old thinking about a new career path.”
The company notes that numerous universities, including California State University, Fullerton, have already incorporated Alteryx’s software into their curriculum and are seeing their students land well-paying jobs as a result.
For more on Alteryx, including a new $50 million venture fund established by the company, see Costelloe’s
Alteryx isn’t the only area tech giant on an educational push.
Privately held IT services provider and consulting firm Trace3, which reported about $1.5B in revenue last year, has launched a “Legends” skills-building program for cloud and cybersecurity work.
The mentoring program was initially an internal program for the Irvine-based company’s own employees. Now it’s getting offered to Trace3’s nearly 3,800 clients. (
Executive Chairman Tyler Beecher, when describing the need to keep IT workers well-versed on the latest technologies, quotes a well-known (although unverified) Abraham Lincoln saying: “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.”
As for Toba Capital’s Vinny Smith, his firm’s investment focus has gone to the dogs.
The firm recently led a $20M round for Small Door Veterinary, an upstart concierge veterinary practice that charges a monthly fee to cat and dog owners.
Now in New York, the company expects to expand to more than 20 locations by 2025.
Fans of In-N-Out Burger’s secret menu will take interest in owner’s Lynsi Snyder’s go-to meal at the iconic burger chain, one of many notable facts you’ll find in this week’s OC 50 edition, which focuses on those shaping the future of Orange County’s economy.
For the record: fried mustard refers to spreading a burger with mustard before it’s grilled.
