{"id":2963,"date":"2025-07-12T01:15:02","date_gmt":"2025-07-12T01:15:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/2963\/"},"modified":"2025-07-12T01:15:02","modified_gmt":"2025-07-12T01:15:02","slug":"ai-leadership-development-platform-praxis-labs-sells-to-torch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/2963\/","title":{"rendered":"AI leadership development platform Praxis Labs sells to Torch"},"content":{"rendered":"<p id=\"speakable-summary\" class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Praxis Labs, a learning development platform, announced its acquisition on Thursday for an undisclosed amount by the <a href=\"https:\/\/torch.io\/newsroom\/torch-acquires-ai-learning-company-praxis-labs-to-redefine-coaching-as-a-catalyst-for-organizational-change\/?utm_source=praxis&amp;utm_medium=website&amp;utm_campaign=praxis_announcement\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">leadership and coaching enterprise Torch<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cAs a small company with fewer than 20 people serving companies as large as Amazon, we knew we needed to build powerful partnerships, across product and go-to-market, to reach more companies,\u201d co-founder and CEO of Praxis Labs, Elise Smith, told TechCrunch about the reason for the sale. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">She and her co-founder, Heather Shen, met Torch CEO Heather Conklin as they were both already working in the leadership development space.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWe were immediately struck, not just by our shared values and mission, but also by how we aligned on what was needed to really future-proof the next general workforce,\u201d Smith continued. \u201cThere was a clear connection and opportunity to connect Torch\u2019s contextual coaching and organizational insights with Praxis\u2019 AI coaching, practice, and skill assessments.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" height=\"680\" width=\"680\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Heather-Conklin-Headshot.jpeg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-3027126\" style=\"width:404px;height:auto\"  \/>Heather Conklin, the CEO of Torch Image Credits:Heather Conklin<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Praxis Labs launched in 2019 and worked with companies such as eBay, Zoom, Amazon, Google, and Target to build out more equitable and inclusive workplaces through leadership training and skill assessments. It notably secured a $15 million Series A back in 2021, making Smith <a href=\"https:\/\/www.businessinsider.com\/black-female-founders-raised-millions-in-vc-this-year-2021-9#6-elise-smith-155-million-6\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">one of the few Black women at the time<\/a> to raise more than $1 million in venture capital funding. Investors in that round included Emerson Collective, Steph Curry\u2019s fund Penny Jar Capital, Precursor Ventures, and Ulu Ventures.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Smith and Shen will join Torch as head of AI growth and head of AI product, respectively. The Praxis team will also be joining Torch.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cRight now, every company and executive team is facing this pivotal question: How will they prepare and manage this next generation of work with humans and AI, while maintaining the human connection that\u2019s essential for real workforce and company transformation?\u201d she said.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cWe\u2019re confident that joining Torch gives us the best possible opportunity to help companies solve this question in this crucial moment.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Praxis Labs, a learning development platform, announced its acquisition on Thursday for an undisclosed amount by the leadership&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2964,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[28,158,3476,1166,3477],"class_list":{"0":"post-2963","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entrepreneurship","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-entrepreneurship","10":"tag-ma","11":"tag-startups","12":"tag-venture"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2963","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2963"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2963\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2964"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2963"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2963"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2963"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}