Desire2Learn (D2L) celebrates two years in Toronto by hiring people to join the team and throwing a party. Here’s your chance to find work while bowling, eating and having fun. D2L is looking to add top tier developers to build strong engineering teams, as well as marketers and salespeople to the growing office at King and Spadina.
A heavyweight in education technology known for its Brightspace integrated learning platform, D2L recently raised an epic $85 million series B round. We all know what this means. That’s D2L going global.
“In the long term, our plan is to expand globally, and continue to hire. We have 15 million students using the platform now, and we’re hoping to grow the user base to over hundred million, to have a lasting impact on learning for schools, universities, and companies all over the world,” John Baker, president and CEO of D2L told BetaKit.
D2L grew from 140 to over 800 people, and plans to add 60 to 100 more this year to the team.
“We are building a big company here, and that takes time. We bootstrapped it for over 12 years, and never looked for a quick exit. We waited, because we wanted to make sure we were raising funds in a way that supported long-term plans. Among all the challenges that come with scale, such as building the right teams, structuring the company, making sure we have communication and collaboration across the organization, we focused relentlessly on the culture. We want the best people to work with D2L,” Baker said. “We work hard, roll up the sleeves, and get our tech better and better every day.”
Like other Canadian startup darlings Hootsuite, Shopify, and Freshbooks, D2L wants to keep its HQ home. Based out of Waterloo and with offices all over the world, D2L is committed to staying put. Baker credits all the universities in the region, an easily accessible international airport, and a sense of stability that’s created over the years for the decision to grow a global brand out of Canada.
“It takes a long time to transform the industry, and so we take a long view. We want to build a lasting company, to be here decades from now,” Baker said.
For Toronto and Kitchener-Waterloo, this is great news. So come down to The Ballroom for the anniversary/recruiting event on October 9th to celebrate two years in Toronto with D2L. Why not join the growing team committed to enable better learning worldwide. Also, this might be your only chance to call McGuinty a colleague. You tell us how that goes!