Emerge Education Captures Capital Investment from Ben Franklin Technology Partners

Emerge will also leverage the new investment to support its newest partnership with Messiah University in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, which was launched in early 2020 at the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic. While new and continuing student enrollment, both on ground and online, slowed across most colleges and universities over the past year, student marketing trends are indicating a potential upswing in the coming months as therapies and vaccines for the virus encourage more confidence in the economy and job market. The company hopes to fuel higher enrollment at Messiah University and its other private and public institutions with the advances in technology and processes achieved through the new investment dollars.

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“We are truly privileged and appreciative to now be associated with Ben Franklin Technology Partners,” says James M. Hunter, CEO of Emerge Education. “As a leading education services provider, we constantly challenge our existing technology and processes to deliver better outcomes for our client institutions. This new investment will help us continue on our path to set ourselves and our clients apart from our competition by exploring new technology initiatives and allowing Emerge to continue to hire experienced professionals who understand the changing landscape of higher education today.”

Emerge is part of an online program management (OPM) market that is certainly growing, with an estimated annual growth rate of 13.2 percent from 2020 to 2025, according to some industry analysts. Since its inception with three founding employees in 2014, Emerge has grown to 26 full-time employees, nearly 100 percent of whom are based in Pennsylvania. The firm also works with a number of subcontractors and advertising agencies located within the region.

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Ben Franklin Technology Partners of Central & Northern PA provides investment capital and business support services to tech-startups and small manufacturers located in a 32-county footprint. The program invests in innovators – sharing the risk that is inherent in starting a business – while providing a funding opportunity that does not require fees, points, collateral, or personal guarantees.

“Our mission is to create synergy among business, industry, and higher education representatives to help stimulate economic development in Pennsylvania, so supporting a locally-grown, education-focused company like Emerge is truly a perfect fit,” says John Sider, Director of Second Stage Capital, Ben Franklin Technology Partners of Central & Northern Pennsylvania. “Our investment opportunities are earmarked for entrepreneurs, small business owners, and existing manufacturing-based companies that want to produce a new technology-based product or improve an existing process. Ultimately when they succeed, we all succeed. The region gains expertise in an emerging technology and new, high-paying jobs are created.”

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