Udemy Banks on Artificial Intelligence to Power Online Learning

0:00Hugo Sarrazin:As a top-performing advisor, you demand top-performing funds. That's why Fidelity's 1 ,000 experienced research professionals combine deep insights and advanced analytics to deliver consistent outcomes for clients across market cycles. Explore 300-plus Morningstar-rated 4 - and 5-star funds at i.fidelity.com slash top funds. Across all fund share classes of Fidelity, Fidelity Advisor Shares, and Fidelity ETFs as of 6-15-2026, past performance is no guarantee of future results. The thing about AI for business, it may not automatically fit the way your business works. At IBM, we've seen this firsthand.

0:38Hugo Sarrazin:But by embedding AI across HR, IT, and procurement processes, we've reduced costs by millions, slash repetitive tasks, and freed thousands of hours for strategic work. Now we're helping companies get smarter by putting AI where it actually pays off, deep in the work that moves the business. Let's create smarter business, IBM. When you're running a business, the best days are the ones where priorities stay on track. For midsize and large companies, that isn't always easy. Risk can touch multiple parts of an organization at the same time, often in ways that aren't immediately obvious. It might involve property, liability, or cyber.

1:17It could stem from regulatory requirements or challenges tied to a specific industry or the scale of an operation. At that level, managing risk becomes an ongoing discipline, not a one-time decision. At The Hartford, the focus is on helping businesses manage risk before it turns into something more disruptive. That means working with companies to identify where they're exposed, decide what matters most, and put practical standards in place so risk is managed as part of day-to-day operations. And when losses do happen, The Hartford can pair that risk-control work with insurance coverage grounded in underwriting, risk engineering, and claims experience developed over time.

1:54Learn more at thehartford.com slash risk mitigation. As industries evolve faster than ever, companies need an environment that accelerates strategic growth, and Michigan delivers on that promise. From emerging startups to global enterprises, Michigan offers what executives value most, a resilient, innovative ecosystem, diverse communities that attract top talent, and a quality of life that supports work-life balance. With our unified Team Michigan approach, businesses scale faster and compete at the highest level. Michigan, pure opportunity. Seize your opportunity at michiganbusiness.org. Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio, news.

2:37You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Tim Stenevek on Bloomberg Radio. You might remember this, Carol. A few months ago, Luis Van An, the founder and CEO of Duolingo, he made some comments on a podcast that got a lot of attention. He basically said, ultimately he's not sure if there's anything computers can't really teach you and that you know teachers might not go away because they need to provide child care and take care of kids and schools do that yeah but that ai the way it's moving that's going to be teaching kids look take it with a grain of salt he's kind of talking his book because he has the app duolingo that uses ai to teach people things but right right got a lot of attention as you can imagine listen if anything we learned in covid though the importance of you know kids being around other kids, being around teachers and people.

3:24It's socializing and socialization. Super, super important. Here's what Hugo Sarazin thinks about all this. He's CEO of the online learning and teaching marketplace Udemy. The company says it has 81 million learners around the world. It has had 120 million course enrollments in the last year. The stock down about 14 and a half percent so far this year. It's got a market cap just north of a billion dollars. He joins us from Miami. Hugo, welcome to the program. You guys are in the midst of this pivot from a learning platform to what you're calling a quote, AI powered skills acceleration platform.

3:56What's the difference? It's pretty profound. First of all, thank you for having me on the show. It's a pleasure to be here. Udemy in its original version ended up being the largest online platform on the B2C, on the B2B side. We have, as you said, on the learner, 80 million plus, but on the enterprise side, 17 ,000 enterprises are depending on us to learn things from IT to business skills to communication to, you know, how to collaborate. So pretty broad. At the same time, there's a limitation. This is a distribution play that allows you to take learning in an asynchronous way. But with AI, we have the opportunity to change the game.

4:47And I think we're making a pretty big pivot to continuous learning, personalized learning. Let's say now you and I take the same class. You may know actually the first, you know, 30 percent, but we're going to run through the same class today. But with AI, I can learn and assess what you know and adapt the course in a way that, you know, it focuses on the area where you need help. And then when you take the class, I can also notice what issue you're encountering and reinforce that through a lab, through an AI role play and other work. So it's a pretty fundamental pivot to the way we're going to deliver the reskilling of the workforce moving forward.

5:29Hugo, what are you learning from, I believe it's about 17 ,000 enterprise customers. I was looking at a recent press release from you guys that you have. What do you learn from them? Because part of what you folks say is you are learning and you're taking in data from those enterprise customers. And what are you learning? And then what are you building on that knowledge? Yeah, we're spending a lot of time learning from our customer. We're a learning platform. We love to learn. I've been in the role six months. I've met more than 400 executives. So a lot of input. But if you turn to the specific, I think right now, this moment, everybody's trying to determine what's the best way to embrace AI.

6:16We have on our platform five times more classes being taken every minute. Eight people enroll in AI classes. So we're seeing the demand for that. At the same time, we're seeing the need for adaptive skills, creative thinking, collaboration, communication. That's up 40 percent. So we're seeing like this duality. And I think it's very interesting to see that as much as the technical skills are important, you know, enterprises are looking for the human side and keep the human aspect of moving forward. How are your B2B sales right now? Carol mentioned some stats right there, but I'm curious about the environment that you see and what you're hearing from these customers and potential customers.

7:07Yeah, so we're 60 % global. So it's a mix of North American, EMEA, Asia-backed. We are obviously continuing to grow, not at the rate that we were growing during the pandemic, where there was a very big discontinuity, but we're seeing some robust growth. At the same time, the uncertainty in the economy, you know, there's a lot of, you know, wait and see. In some cases, people are investing in technology and then are realizing that just the technology is not enough. So there's a catch up and a rush to bring in the reskilling. So it's a bit of a, you know, a mixed set of signals. But for our business, we're lucky because we have something that is going to be required.

7:54I mean, the World Economic Forum, the next five years, 92 million people in developed countries will need to be reskill for AI and really well positioned for that. Well, and it's interesting if I look at, you know, the FA function on the Bloomberg, which really, you know, pulls up your balance sheet and just looking at revenue, the mix between consumer and enterprise, you go back to 2019 or 2020 and it was largely consumer. But the shift has been kind of dramatic, right, in terms of the percentage of revenues that is now enterprise. I think our data shows something like 63 percent of what you guys do.

8:27That's the growth. That's the model going forward. It is. Well, we're going to continue to be in the consumer space. I think we've been making a very profound shift towards the enterprise space. We've got the leading platform in the market today. In the consumer space, we do have a business that maybe in the last few years we haven't invested sufficiently. And then we're seeing some very interesting signals there, too. I think right now, as you know, the job markets, the new graduates are struggling to find jobs. They may not have been prepared for what this economy is requiring. And they turn to platforms like Unimi to kind of a bit of a finishing school.

9:16They're taking on a specific class to learn and they're building their portfolio of projects. So we're seeing a bit of a shift. But what we're going to do is we're going to try to capture that shift instead of via transactional course by course. We're now offering subscription and we're trying to be a place where you can continuously learn and evolve and set yourself career goals. And we're partnering with Indeed and other firms to facilitate that. Hey, Hugo, just 30 seconds on this. Are you using AI to design the courses and actually do that content? How do you do that? Yeah, so internally we have a learner team that focuses on how to use AI to personalize the experience.

10:00We have an instructor team that is finding ways to automate and streamline the process so that you can create the curriculum, you can create examples, you can generate images if that's what you needed. So we're making all of that super easy so that the instructor can spend their time where, you know, they're applying their critical thinking. They're finding analogies. They're finding ways to engage the students in better ways. All right. We're going to leave it there. Hey, Hugo, thank you. Really appreciate it. Have a good weekend. Hugo Sarrazin, he's chief executive officer of the online learning and teaching marketplace Udemy, joining us from Miami.

10:41When you're running a business, the best days are the ones where priorities stay on track. For midsize and large companies, risk can affect multiple parts of the organization at once, from property and liability to cyber and regulatory challenges. At that level, managing risk becomes an ongoing discipline. At the Hartford, the focus is on helping businesses manage risk before it turns into something more disruptive. And when losses do happen, that work is paired with insurance coverage shaped by years of underwriting, risk engineering, and claims experience. Learn more at thehartford.com slash risk mitigation.

11:16Policies provided by Hartford Fire Insurance Company and its property and casualty affiliates, Hartford, Connecticut. As industries evolve faster than ever, companies need an environment that accelerates strategic growth. And Michigan delivers on that promise. From emerging startups to global enterprises, Michigan offers what executives value most, a resilient, innovative ecosystem, diverse communities that attract top talent, and a quality of life that supports work-life balance. With our unified Team Michigan approach, businesses scale faster and compete at the highest level. Michigan, pure opportunity.

11:49Seize your opportunity at michiganbusiness.org. These days, it seems like AI agents are just about everywhere you turn, every field and every function. But without identity, you can't trust they'll serve your business instead of jeopardizing it. Fortunately, Okta helps you get identity right by securing your AI agent's identities, giving you a single layer of control, a single standard of trust. So whether an AI agent supports a single user or your entire enterprise with Okta, you'll turn risk into opportunity. Secure every agent, secure any agent. Okta secures AI. Healthcare doesn't always work great.

12:25If you've ever waited on a refill or couldn't schedule an appointment, you get it. That's the kind of stuff Optum is changing. They're using data and technology to integrate patient care, pharmacy, and everything else. So healthcare is connected, not complicated. What's that look like? Cheaper prescriptions that are easier to get and care that looks at the whole person. How you need it. Optum is helping make healthcare work as one for everyone. Learn more at business.optum.com.