industry education learning management systems mooc founded 2008 headquarters salt lake city utah key people josh coates ceo products canvas canvas k 12 canvas network bridge website http www.instructure.com instructure is an educational technology company based in salt lake city utah . it is the developer of the canvas learning management system which is a comprehensive cloud native software package that competes with such systems as blackboard learning system moodle d2l and sakai project . instructure also developed canvas network 1 a massive open online course platform . contents 1 history 2 products 2.1 canvas 2.2 canvas k 12 2.3 canvas network 2.4 bridge 3 see also 4 references 5 external links history edit instructure was founded in 2008 by two byu graduate students brian whitmer and devlin daley 2 with initial funding from mozy founder josh coates currently the ceo and epic ventures . 3 in december 2010 the utah education network uen which represents a number of utah colleges and universities announced that instructure would be replacing blackboard as their preferred lms . 4 by january 2013 instructure s lms platform was in use by more than 300 colleges universities and k 12 districts and the company s customer base had increased to more than 425 halfway through 2013 and 9 million users by the end of 2013 . 5 6 in february 2011 instructure announced that they were making their flagship product canvas freely available under an agpl license as open source software . instructure s announcement received coverage in the press . 7 8 9 10 in february 2012 the company launched canvas k 12 . 11 in november 2012 instructure entered the massive open online course market by launching canvas network . 12 in june 2013 instructure secured 30 million in series d funding bringing their lifetime funding total to 50m . 13 in february 2015 instructure raised another 40 million in series e funding raising their lifetime funding total to 90m . ceo josh coates described it as a pre ipo round . 14 on november 13 2015 instructure began trading as a publicly held company on the new york stock exchange nyse inst . 15 products edit canvas edit instructure inc. was created in order to support the continued development of a new learning management system lms originally named instructure . once incorporated the founders changed the name of the software to canvas . the utah based company tested the lms at several local schools including utah state university and brigham young university before officially launching canvas . canvas was built using ruby on rails as the web application framework backed by a postgresql database . it incorporates jquery html5 and css3 to provide a modern user interface . oauth is used to provide limited access to a user s information on certain social media sites like facebook and twitter to allow for collaboration between sites . canvas operates as a software as a service using amazon web services in the cloud . canvas k 12 edit in february 2012 instructure launched canvas k 12 an lms platform designed for the specific needs of elementary and secondary schools . 16 the lms enrolls parents with their students to provide greater visibility into their children s learning experience and provides actionable analytics to teachers and administrators . canvas network edit in november 2012 instructure entered the massive open online course mooc market by launching canvas network . 17 instructure s approach to mooc has been to facilitate experimentation with pedagogy and new ways to use multimedia environments to change cognition and enhance the learning process . one example is gender through comic books a mooc taught by ball state university s christina blanch on canvas network that used lessons from pop culture to explore evolving social norms and other anthropological ideals . 18 in july 2013 instructure partnered with qualtrics a utah based company to survey mooc participants on instructure s canvas network about their motivations for enrolling in and completing these courses . 19 the results suggested that educators rethink ways to fully leverage the online learning environment to make the educational experience more engaging and interesting . bridge edit on february 18 2015 instructure officially launched bridge 20 their new cloud based corporate lms . this launch followed 40 million raised in series e funding led by insight venture partners . epic ventures and bessemer venture partners also participated in the funding . 21 this round raised their total lifetime funding to close to 90 million . at launch bridge served six corporate clients including oregon state university which had also been using instructure s canvas lms for their students . 14 see also edit history of virtual learning environments virtual learning environment references edit canvas network sara israelsen hartley june 20 2010 . byu grads introduce education savvy software . deseret news . retrieved february 23 2011 . instructure crunchbase profile . crunchbase . interserve dba techcrunch . retrieved february 23 2011 . uen committee selects instructure to provide statewide learning management system for state colleges and universities . uen news . utah education network . december 14 2010 . retrieved february 22 2011 . empson rip . with 4.5 m users instructure takes on the courseras & udacities of the world with its own open course network . techcrunch . http www.capterra.com infographics top lms software dan dzombak february 2 2011 . a fiery new competitor . the motley fool . the motley fool llc . retrieved february 22 2011 . michael arrington january 31 2011 . instructure launches to root blackboard out of universities . techcrunch.com . interserve dba techcrunch . retrieved february 22 2011 . josh keller january 31 2011 . upstart course management provider goes open source . wired campus . the chronicle of higher education . retrieved february 22 2011 . christopher dawson february 1 2011 . there are alternatives to blackboard and moodle instructure canvas goes open source . zdnet education . cbs interactive . retrieved february 22 2011 . canvas k 12 http www.instructure.com k 12 rip empson october 31 2012 . with 4.5 m users instructure takes on the courseras & udacities of the world with its own open course network techcrunch . techcrunch . techcrunch.com.com . retrieved september 7 2014 . instructure secures 30 million in series d funding marketwatch . market watch . marketwatch.com . june 5 2013 . retrieved september 7 2014 . a b locke charley 2015 02 24 . instructure plots path to ipo corporate customers after 40m series e . edsurge . schaffler rhonda 2015 11 13 . instructure ipo debuts on nyse with double digit gain . thestreet . box spins embed onecloud for educational use at k 12 schools universities . zdnet . nagel david . instructure creates free canvas network for online courses . campus technology . knox kelly . new online course explores gender through comic books . wired . f. carr david . mooc students attracted most by course topics . information week . buhr sarah 2015 02 18 . on the way to an ipo education technology startup instructure is close to raising a big new round . techcrunch . marino jonathan 2015 02 18 . education tech startup instructure has raised 40 million . business insider . external links edit official website retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title instructure & oldid 738538769 categories learning management systemscompanies based in utahfree educational software2008 establishments in utahprivately held companies based in utah navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload 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