Ted Oyerinde and Teddy Solomon know a thing or two about building sustainable communities.
After all, Oyerinde is the founder and chancellor of the online school Campus, while Solomon is the co-founder of the college social app Fizz.
The two spoke at TechCrunch Disrupt this year about the strategies that helped them grow their companies while maintaining consumer interest.
The campus offers associate degrees in fields such as information technology and business administration. It also offers certifications in specialties such as cosmetology and phlebotomy. Oyerinde says the campus has more than 3,000 students enrolled and employs more than 100 professors on at least a part-time basis.
Oyerinde said the campus has decided to launch a la carte Because employers, in particular, are demanding classes that can teach their employees personal skills like coding.
He has realized that many people want to enhance their skills and believes that in the future, everyone will have some type of membership or subscription service that will help them develop new skills.
“Everyone in this room, not just people getting a two-year degree, will be able to go to campus and learn with us,” he told the audience. “Live, online classes, taught by amazing people.”
techcrunch event
san francisco
,
October 13-15, 2026
Oyerinde uses the Pell Grant to help keep school affordable for most people. His company also has a team of billionaires at the cap table — like OpenAI’s Sam Altman and Discord’s Jason Citroën — which means he doesn’t feel as much pressure to focus on profits above everything else, he said.
“They don’t need the money,” he added. “What they really want is to fundamentally shape the way education works in this country for the better.”
Meanwhile, Fizz works on more More than 200 college campuses And at one time it operated in high schools across the country. It has raised more than $40 million with investors including Owl Ventures and NEA.
Since launching in 2021, Solomon said the company has adopted features like a peer-to-peer marketplace, with over 100,000 items listed, and a video element so people can write more than text posts.
Now, the company is looking to create a product called Global Fizz to expand the product beyond the US. Solomon talked more about it on TechCrunch’s Equity Podcast, where he outlined the company’s future.
Solomon told the audience that the company is considering monetization methods, particularly focusing on advertising. “We have already worked with companies like Perplexity,” he said.
“There are subscription models that have worked well with apps, but right now we’re focused on our advertising business, and we’re focused on building a great product that keeps our users around and makes them happy.”
After all, he said, “users are everything.”
