Academic Benchmarking Consortium, a startup in Chapel Hill, is helping higher education institutions find “reliable, actionable” benchmarking data to help them deal with such issues as administration costs.

Its key is proprietary methodology through which data is collected, mapped and insights developed.

And universities are showing interest. ABC membership has increased to 10 institutions over the past year, there is a strong pipeline of interest, and the company may go international, says CEO Steve Beisser.

ABC is among the presenters at CED’s Tech Venture conference.

This Q&A is part of a series published by WRAL TechWire in partnership with the CED.

  • What is the focus of your business?

Our mission is to improve strategic decision-making within higher education by providing reliable, actionable benchmarking data with an initial focus on administrative labor costs.

  • What is the top pain point/business application you are seeking to address?

Providing visibility into the currently opaque drivers of the upwardly spiraling cost for administration within higher education.

  • What makes it unique?

We have created ABC Insights, the premier benchmarking platform for finance executives within higher education. It is designed to allow members to easily perform comparative analyses against peer institutions and to share best practices.

Since we are a membership based organization, member universities bypass their RFP process. This greatly simplifies the process for joining.

  • Why should investors be interested in your firm?

A year ago we had 1 member university. Today we have 10 with a very strong pipeline of interested universities.

The benchmarking platform we have developed has its roots in the US healthcare benchmarking industry, an industry which is trapped within the US market due to the unique structure of the US healthcare industry.

We are already in talks with numerous Canadian universities, so we may be international by year end as higher education systems are very similar across the globe.

Business facts:

  • Website – http://www.abc-insights.com
  • Email address for inquiries – steve@abc-insights.com
  • Physical address – 308 W. Rosemary Street, Suite 307, Chapel Hill, NC 27516
  • CEO – Steve Beisser