Insider Brief
- Canyon GBS secured $12.9 million from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to enhance its Advising App SaaS solution, focusing on improving student outcomes and boosting productivity for underserved higher education institutions.
- The funding will support the development of a self-service student engagement portal, a mobile app, and expanded capabilities for staff in the existing student success suite, leveraging AI-powered tools to drive academic success and operational efficiency.
- From 2025 to 2027, Canyon GBS will co-design solutions with institutions like Joliet Junior College and Baker College to address challenges in student support, accessibility, and productivity, ensuring scalable and impactful systems.
PRESS RELEASE — Canyon GBS is thrilled to announce it has secured $12.9 million in new funding to revolutionize student support services with self-service engagement tools for students and innovative technology to empower student service professionals. The R&D work will take place over three years, from 2025 through 2027, and will enable Canyon GBS to expand its Advising App SaaS solution, introducing transformative technology that helps higher education institutions improve student outcomes and boost productivity. The work is funded through a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
The award-winning product Advising App, which Canyon GBS launched in October 2023, currently features three primary modules to support institution staff: a student success suite to manage engagement with enrolled students, an enterprise artificial intelligence (AI) advisor, and an admissions suite to manage engagement with prospective students. This new funding will enable Canyon GBS to extend Advising App by introducing a new self-service student engagement portal and mobile application, while also expanding the capabilities of the existing student success suite for staff. The goal of this initiative is to create an affordable, innovative system of engagement designed with and for underserved institutions and their students — ensuring they have access to powerful and compliant AI along with cutting-edge technology that supports academic success and institutional productivity.
“Our mission is to transform how underserved institutions can leverage affordable, advanced technology to drive meaningful student outcomes and operational excellence,” said Joseph Licata, CEO of Canyon GBS. “With this grant, we are positioned to dramatically expand Advising App’s impact, bringing disruptive, AI-powered tools that support both students and staff. From 2025 to 2027, we’ll work closely with students, staff, and administrators at partner institutions to co-design the technology that directly addresses challenges in student success, productivity, and accessibility. This collaboration will deliver innovative, scalable support systems that higher education needs to meet today’s demands.”
Notable institutions such as Joliet Junior College and Baker College have already adopted Advising App, while Thesis, the creator of the cloud-based Elements student information system (SIS), resells an AI-powered student success solution called Elements Engagement, built on the Advising App platform.
