We are Rise Up

Rise Up was founded by two brothers who saw a great opportunity and moved quickly to own it.  

In 2014, Arnaud and Guillaume Blachon were working at an audiovisual company and realized that no one was able to connect videoconferencing with learning. Finding an office in the ESSEC incubator, they launched an innovative solution on the market; Rise Up was born to broaden the horizon of corporate learning.  

After developing a digital campus, the company launched its SaaS learning software solution in 2016, focusing on blended learning, connecting face-to-face, e-learning, and hybrid training.  

In 2017, Rise Up signed its first major customer Schneider Electric to implement a program to train the company’s partners on its new products, with over 20,000 learners across Europe.  Schneider Electric remains a loyal Rise Up customer today.  

The company secured initial seed funding in 2018 from several investors, including IMPACT Partners, Bpifrance, and BNP Paribas, and expanded into Portugal, Luxembourg, and Belgium.  

In 2020, Rise Up secured its first round of investment funding with MAIF Avenir, IMPACT Partners, and Bpifrance, launched into the Netherlands and grew from 15 to 50 employees. By May 2020, Rise Up counted more than one million users on its platform.

In 2021, Rise Up signed a strategic partnership and equity investment with Ifpass. The team continued to expand across Europe, forging into the UK and German markets. Thanks to its tremendous growth, the company earned recognition from Capterra, HR Tech Outlook, LPI, and Fosway Group.

In May 2022, Rise Up raised €30M with Connected Capital, a leading B2B SaaS-focused investment fund, MAIF Avenir, and Impact Partners, allowing the company to expand its commercial organization and product suite as well as localize its solutions for European markets.   

In 2023, Rise Up has over 125 employees between Paris, London, Amsterdam, Belgium, Munich, and Lisbon and having doubled the team each year, leading to an accelerating Core Challenger status in the 2023 Fosway 9-Grid™ for Learning Systems.

Today, Rise Up remains a one-stop-shop learning technology stack – LMS, LXP and Authoring Tool, omnichannel and multimodal service – that delivers technological innovation by harnessing AI and ML; is easy-to-use for learners, trainers, and administrators; and delivers both learning and business success for customers. 

For nearly a decade, the brothers and the Rise Up team have been on a relentless pursuit of innovation and unwavering dedication to excellence in workplace learning as Rise Up continually challenges the traditional players in the market whilst keeping connectivity and accessibility for learners at the heart of the mission.

We believe organizations must accelerate Time to Skill^TM, enabling learning to transform business, anchoring learning in the daily routines of employees and delivering training at business speed.

Our LearningOps^TM framework combines business-driven methodology, innovative technology, customer-driven service and ongoing evaluation to provide a personalized learning experience for everyone, every day. 

We know that every moment counts, and we want to help people improve their present and future by acting now.  We empower everyone to own today. 

Co-Founder and Chief Technology & Product Officer  

After obtaining an engineering degree in computer science at EPITA, and a university degree in Mandarin Chinese at Université Paris Cité, Guillaume began his career as an information system consultant. He was a program manager for Videlio and then head of R&D at G2J.com (after Arnaud!). While launching Rise Up, he completed the entrepreneur’s program at The Founder Institute. Throughout his career, Guillaume has developed his expertise and skills to combine human needs and technological solutions. Today, his ambition is to strengthen the company’s DNA on technology and innovation by building strong synergies among internal, customer and partner teams.