Orbis Education

VentureWire Coverage of Our Series B Investment

Orbis Education To Take On Nursing Shortage With $8M Series B

Indianapolis (VentureWire) -- Online education company Orbis Education Services Inc. has raised an $8 million Series B round to expand the national reach of its programs to create more nurses.

New investor Lightspeed Venture Partners led the round, which included individuals. Valuation of the round, which closed in December, was not disclosed.

Orbis provides online nursing programs aimed at alleviating factors contributing to a national nursing shortage, Chief Executive Dan Briggs said. Pay rates for nursing teachers are lower than working in the field, while nursing schools face enrollment limits. Those restrictions could hinder the admission of new entrants to the profession as it faces a building shortage and as baby boomers age, he said.

The Indianapolis-based company, founded in 2003, aims to tackle those problems by enabling professional instructors to work part-time and expanding enrollment through its virtual classes.

Orbis' nursing programs eliminate time spent in a classroom through its online delivery, which includes online classes, threaded discussions, Webcasts and proctored exams. The programs also incorporate traditional requirements, including practice labs with mannequins and about 800 to 1,000 hours served in hospitals.

Orbis plans to expand its reach by expanding the number of colleges and universities it works with. The company is partnering with Glendale Adventist Medical Center, Marian University, San Diego State University, Sharp HealthCare, St. Vincent Health and University of Oklahoma.

With the Series B funds, Orbis plans to extend its number of partners, targeting particular states like California, where nursing shortages are worst. The new round is slated to last several years, he said.

Orbis had about $5 million in revenue in 2009. Prior to the Series B, the company raised about $8.2 million through individual investors and members of its management team.

Lightspeed's investment was not in the typical geographic investment area for the firm, said Principal Andrew Chung, while it further expands the firm's reach in the education sector. Other Lightspeed education investments include online tutoring services provider TutorVista Global Pvt. Ltd. and auto repair vocational training company China Vocational Training, which operates under the name Beifang.

The new funding injection should help Orbis build the largest online-enabled nursing program in the country, said Chung, who has joined the company's board with the round.

Orbis Announces $8 million Series B Financing Led by Lightspeed Venture Partners

INDIANAPOLIS, IN ( January 19, 2009 ) – Orbis Education, a developer of nursing education solutions, has announced the completion of its $8 million Series B financing, led by Lightspeed Venture Partners of Menlo Park, California. The funding will allow Orbis Education to broadly expand its hybrid online nursing education programs and in turn, help alleviate the nation’s wide-spread nursing shortages.

 

Led by an experienced team of education and healthcare veterans, Orbis Education works with colleges and universities to develop online nursing programs, recruit new qualified students, and manage the delivery of these programs. Orbis’s current partners include innovative leaders in the nursing education and healthcare fields, including San Diego State University, the University of Oklahoma, Marian University, Sharp HealthCare, St. Vincent Health, and Glendale Adventist Medical Center.

 

“The next decade will be extremely important in the quest to combat the nursing shortage,” said Daniel J. Briggs, Chief Executive Officer of Orbis.   “This new infusion of capital by Lightspeed will allow Orbis Education to broadly deliver one-stop educational services to healthcare organizations and universities looking to recruit and graduate more qualified nurses, more quickly.” 

 

“Orbis has an innovative and cost-effective model for helping nursing schools expand student capacity and generate a high-quality pool of nursing graduates,” according to Andrew Chung, a Principal at Lightspeed Venture Partners who will take a seat on the company's board of directors. “Orbis offers a timely solution rooted in proven learning methodologies to a societal problem that will continue to intensify over time. We are excited about the company’s long-term ability to revolutionize the nursing education field.”

 

The aging population, aging nurse workforce, and spotlight on healthcare reform all contribute to a widely publicized nationwide nursing shortage. A recent study by the Bureau of Labor Statistics has indicated that nearly 600,000 new nursing positions will need to be created by 2016 to address the current shortfall, and the Bureau of Health Professions estimates that 90 percent more nurses will need to be graduated from nursing programs to meet that demand. Also, according to Vanderbilt University, four out of every ten nurses in the U.S. are over the age of 50 and will retire in the next ten years, exacerbating the shortage.

Blending technology and traditional methods, Orbis Education powers the collaborations that accelerate nursing program enrollments. Leveraging Orbis Education’s Full Circle Solutions, a hospital becomes a virtual extension of a major university.   Theory courses are taught by university nursing faculty via interactive online classes that include threaded discussions, real-time webcasts, projects, assignments and proctored examinations. Students have the flexibility of completing the online courses during day or evening hours and hands-on clinical preparation is taught by appointed university faculty assigned to work directly with students.

In partnership with universities and leading hospitals, Orbis Education creates an ideal nursing pipeline of men and women who are able to quickly transition from students to employees upon graduation.

 

About Orbis Education

 

Founded in 2003, Orbis Education creates, manages, and markets collaborative nursing education solutions that alleviate nursing shortages for hospitals and healthcare systems. Orbis leverages alliances with leading nursing schools and healthcare networks to provide flexible and customized nursing programs. The company currently has strategic partnerships with leading institutions like San Diego State University, the University of Oklahoma, Marian University, Sharp HealthCare, St. Vincent Health, and Glendale Adventist Medical Center. For more information, visit www.orbiseducation.com

 

About Lightspeed Venture Partners

 

Lightspeed Venture Partners is a leading global venture capital firm with over $2 billion of committed capital under management. Lightspeed’s investment professionals and advisors are located in Silicon Valley, China, India and Israel. Over the past two decades, the Lightspeed team has backed more than 150 companies, many of which have become leaders in their respective markets, including Blue Nile, Brocade, Calista, Ciena, DoubleClick, eHealth, Galileo Technology, Growth Networks, Informatica, Kiva Software, LightLogic, Maker Communications, Metasolv, Openwave, Quantum Effect Devices, Riverbed, Sirocco, Virsa Systems and Waveset. For more information, please visit http://www.lightspeedvp.com.

Short-Term Surplus Doesn't Mean Long-Term Solution

As we spend time with hospital leaders across the country, we occasionally hear stories about how the nursing shortage has abated.  This week, a story in Crain's New York Business said that the "nurse shortage has been replaced by a job shortage."  

If state leaders, who fund a fast majority of the nursing programs in this country, believe that the nursing shortage is over, and that money no longer needs to flow to nursing programs, this will certainly increase the future shortage.  We speak with CNO's every week who know that this is a short-term blip on a long-term trend.  The average age of nurses hasn't changed.  The number of faculty teaching students hasn't increased overnight.  We still need a paradigm shift in the way nurses are educated.

Orbis Education Named As One of Indiana's "50 Companies to Watch"

Orbis Education has been recognized as one of the 2009 Indiana Companies to Watch, an awards program presented by the Indiana Economic Development Corporation, its Small Business Development Center network, Purdue University and the Edward Lowe Foundation.

Fifty companies from Indiana will be honored as outstanding second-stage companies during the second annual Indiana Companies to Watch awards program, held on August 27 in Indianapolis. 

Companies honored range from traditional businesses involved in manufacturing, financial services and retail trade to high-tech companies working in the life sciences, information technology, telecommunications, and aerospace industries.

 

“We are very honored to be presented with this award,” says Daniel J. Briggs, CEO of Orbis Education.  “Our company has been working diligently for years to help bring an effective means of alleviating the nursing shortage in Indiana as well as across the United States.”

 

Companies to Watch firms must employ between six and 150 full-time equivalent employees, have between $750,000 and $100 million in annual revenue or working capital in place, and demonstrate the intent and capacity to grow based on employee or sales growth, exceptional entrepreneurial leadership, sustainable competitive advantage or other notable strengths.

 

This year, more than 500 Indiana companies, representing 59 Indiana counties, were nominated for the Companies to Watch program. The number of applicants was narrowed to 214 businesses, from 50 counties. From that pool, 106 finalists were selected, and 50 companies from 17 counties emerged to become the 2009 Indiana Companies to Watch.

 

For more information on the 2009 Indiana Companies to Watch, visit http://indiana.companiestowatch.org.  For more information about Orbis Education, visit www.orbiseducation.com.

 

 

CINHC: California Nursing Shortage Still Exists

Surprise!  According to the California Institute for Nursing and Health Care, the nursing shortage in California may be smaller than previously thought, but apparently reports of its demise have been greatly exaggerated.

We continue to see stories about the shrinking nursing shortage. This is dangerous, because we can lull ourselves into a fall sense of security about the future of the profession.  Deloras Jones, Executive Director of the CINHC, said it perfectly:

"The last time nursing school enrollment contracted in response to new grad hiring trends, it took 10 years to recover," Jones said. "Not until 2004 did California graduate the same number of nurses that graduated in 1994."

More on the CINHC study is available on the Healthcare Finance News site.

A Few Photos from our Ribbon Cutting in Indianapolis

On Wednesday, May 13th, we officially opened the facilities for our new collaboration in Indianapolis between Marian College and St. Vincent Health.  Here are a few images from the ceremony:

 Kyle DeFur, Karen Hardin, Darcy Burthay, Tom Enneking, Dan Elsener, and Vince Caponi

  

 

The End of the Nursing Shortage?

All over the media recently, we've seen stories about an abatement in the nursing shortage.  You can see it here.  And here.  And here.

Headlines like "There's no more nursing shortage, thanks to the recession" do a serious disservice to our communities.  We recently exhibited at the American Organization of Nurse Executive (AONE) annual meeting in San Antonio, and we heard from nurse executives from all across the country.  The message is clear:  there may be a temporary easing of nurses as the economy falters, but that is a band-aid solution that will peel right off when things recover.  The average age of a nurse is not decreasing.  The supply/demand numbers have not changed.  Temporary upticks are not long-term solutions.

The time to be diligent about addressing the shortage is now.

Sharp Creates Video with Mention of Our Program in San Diego

We can't say enough what great partners our friends at Sharp HealthCare are in San Diego.  Check out this video for a mention of our collaboration between Sharp and the University of Oklahoma.

Re-Launch of Orbis Education Blog

Due to some technical difficulties, we have had to restart our corporate blog.  We are attempting to recover old data, but we are not sure how feasible that will be.

Stay tuned for updates on Orbis Education.  We're growing quickly!