The API-ification of Education

The API-ification of EducationWhat do Uber, Spotify and Airbnb have in common?

Gavin CooneyCEO & Co-Founder of Learnositygavin.cooney@learnosity.com

AboutCo-founded by CEO Chris Contini in 2002

MissionProvide our educational partners with intuitive cloud-basedsystems that inform, inspire, and connect.

Scope of ServicesOffer products that support student management, curriculum/instruction, staff performance, and starting in May 2016, interactive assessment augmented by Learnosity.

Agenda- The API Economy

- Build vs Buy. What to Consider

- OnCourse Classroom Sneak Peak

- Questions

Learnosity- B2B, SaaS assessment technology company

- Team of 60

- New York, Los Angeles, Dublin & Sydney

The Learnosity VisionTo deliver on the promise of technology in education

We believe in education- It’s the most important investment we can make in our future

We can make a difference- We impact the most students by empowering all companies

to offer powerful, interactive assessmentWe’re geeks at heart...

- ...and love nothing more than the challenge of creating cutting-edge software that people love to use.

The API Economy- Increased productivity enabled by packaging

commodity, yet complex, functionality into reusable “building blocks”

- Successful companies are choosing to “build” their products by leveraging the services and infrastructure of other organizations alongside their own unique user experience and brand

- Many of the fastest growing products are actually “composites” of various 3rd party services

http://techcrunch.com/2015/03/18/battle-for-the-building-blocks/#.duhfvl:D7PB

Uber builds on:- Google Maps (GPS)- Twilio (in app communication)- AWS (hosting & storage)- Checkr (background checks)- Braintree (payment processing)- TUNE (analytics & measuring)- Sift Science (fraud detection)

UBER- Checkr (background checks)- Google Map - Twilio (in app communication)- Braintree (payment

processing)- AWS (hosting & storage)

LYFT- Checkr (background checks)- Google Map - Twilio (in app communication)- Braintree (payment

processing)- AWS (hosting & storage)

HAILO- Google Map - Twilio (in app communication)- Braintree (payment

processing)- AWS (hosting & storage)

So do competitors Lyft and Hailo...

AirBnB builds with:

- SendGrid (email delivery)

- Twilio (phone & text)

- BrainTree (payments)

Spotify builds onOmnifoneon AWS

Undifferentiated Heavy LiftingIs there any point in owning the technology if

you’re going to end up years behind the

technology your competition licensed?

Why Reinvent the Wheel?

Sunk Cost Fallacy

Practicing what we preach

We leverage AWS for:

- Hosting & storage- Relational Database Service ( provides cost-efficient and

resizable capacity while managing time-consuming DB admin tasks)

- Cross region replication (new feature that automatically replicates data across AWS regions.)

Datadog for monitoring- Spent considerable time & resources

building our own monitoring system- Replaced it with Datadog- Difficult decision to scrap what we had built

on our own.- Freed up our DevOps team to focus on

other more important areas.

Desmos for graphing- Have built most of our existing graphing

functionality with JSX graph. Also built standard four function and scientific calculators.

- Desmos offers more flexibility & capability for Cartesian graphing & graphing calculators, so we are going to replace JSX graph in these areas.

Build vs Buy

What should I consider whenchoosing to build or buy?

Cost (finite resources)- Capital- Human resources (developers)- Hosting - Opportunity cost

Time Sensitivity- How quickly do you need to get to market?- What happens if you have to postpone launch?

Quality- What are your core competencies?- How bespoke do you need features to be?- Is the feature a core differentiator in the market?

Ongoing Maintenance & Technical Debt- Tech is constantly changing and updating. - New browsers- New devices- New Operating systems

Support- Support in a crisis- Backups- Training

If I decide to buy, what should I look for?

- Support Levels- Training- Customizability- Security

- Future roadmap of vendor

OnCourse Classroom LMS

Questions?

If we don’t get to answer your question during the webinar, just leave your question and email in the chat comments and we’ll respond individually!