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Boca-based edtech startup Honorlock raises $25M Series B round

Nancy Dahlberg
Nancy Dahlberg
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Honorlock, a Boca Raton-based startup focused on  protecting academic testing integrity, announced it has raised a $25 million Series B funding round led by Owl Ventures, the largest edtech VC fund in the world. Participating in the round  were Silicon Valley firm Defy Partners, Florida-based Arsenal Growth and other existing investors.
The funding follows Honorlock’s $11.5 million Series A round a year ago. In total, the startup has raised $40.7 million, according to Crunchbase.
Honorlock, founded in 2015 and incubated at FAU Tech Runway, offers an online proctoring service for educational institutions to protect academic integrity in online assessments.  Today, Honorlock’s cloud-based proctoring system integrates with all the major learning management platforms, and its customers include University of Wisconsin, University of Florida, Georgia Institution of Technology and Texas A&M. Honorlock employs 134 people, with about 50 of them in South Florida, and is hiring for positions in operations and technology, which can be  found here.

Michael Hemlepp

 Honorlock plans to use the funding to further accelerate market share and growth within the higher education market, as well as enter new markets. “Our goals are to strengthen existing relationships and develop new relationships as higher education institutions look at the post-pandemic remote learning landscape,” said  Michael Hemlepp, CEO of Honorlock.

Honorlock’s  “AI plus human-touch proctoring platform” enables academic institutions and organizations that provide customer and partner education to offer remote assessments while protecting exam integrity. When schools and businesses closed because of the pandemic and remote learning became the new norm for college students and workers seeking professional development and certifications, Honorlock’s business took off.
Hemlepp expects demand for online-proctored exams will continue as more students head back to in-person classes.  “With proctored exams, students can take their exam within a wider range of time, can take the exam from any location and in a comfortable environment of their choosing. Proctored exams also create access for students that may not otherwise be able to take in-person, on campus exams. They enable fully remote learning structures and protect the integrity of the school, the instructors and validate the degree,” he said.  
At the same time, many instructors now prefer proctored exams because it frees up classroom time that can be used for teaching and student support, and the data helps them better understand how individual students approach their exams, Hemlepp said.
Added Amit Patel, managing director at Owl Ventures: “Honorlock is helping move education forward by solving some of the most complex challenges schools face when building an effective and fair remote-learning infrastructure. The opportunity to be at the forefront of this shift to remote access is big, and we believe in this team’s ability and passion to lead the way.”
Follow @ndahlberg on Twitter and email her at [email protected]

Nancy Dahlberg
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