Abu Dhabi, UAE / Singapore / Fontainebleau, France– 2 September 2025 – INSEAD, The Business School for the World, and SC Ventures, the innovation and ventures unit of Standard Chartered, today announced the launch of Lexarius, an AI-powered EdTech venture with a bold vision to unlock human potential everywhere by making learning deeply experiential. Lexarius has introduced a breakthrough role-play and coaching platform designed to transform corporate L&D by accelerating skill acquisition.
The launch is a significant milestone in INSEAD’s innovation journey. It showcases the school’s ability to translate academic insight into real-world impact, taking an internally generated concept and successfully commercialising it through collaboration with a leading global partner.
As the need for reskilling and upskilling reaches unprecedented heights, experiential learning offers a valuable extension to traditional methods, such as coaching and workshops, expanding their reach and impact in a more scalable and cost-effective way. Lexarius is designed to address this need by using advanced avatars and agentic AI to deliver:
- Engaging conversations that respond dynamically to learner input, recreating challenging workplace scenarios in leadership, business development, and customer service
- Real-time personalised coaching after each conversation, providing feedback on strengths and areas for improvement, and creating a powerful learning loop
- Scalable deployment with content tailored to different industries, roles, and regions, including conversations in over 20 different languages.
Francisco Veloso, Dean of INSEAD, said, “This venture strongly reflects INSEAD’s commitment to human-centered AI and our belief that technology should amplify human potential. Establishing Lexarius as a separate entity allows INSEAD to reach unserved and underserved segments of corporate education. It will also complement our existing online and in-person teaching, providing genuine pedagogical value to our students and participants. This partnership represents a model for how INSEAD shapes the future of business education through strategic partnerships, academic expertise and entrepreneurial action.”
Lexarius combines the strengths of its founding institutions – INSEAD’s expertise in executive education and experiential learning, and SC Ventures’ enterprise-grade infrastructure – while adding its deep expertise in AI and technology innovation.
“Lexarius shows what’s possible when academic excellence meets venture-building execution,” said Alex Manson, CEO of SC Ventures. “It fills a critical gap in corporate training with a scalable solution that enhances behavioural change — the decisive factor that so often determines whether corporate transformations succeed or fail.”
“At Lexarius, our mission is to empower organisations and individuals to thrive in an era of disruption by closing the knowing–doing gap,” said Peter Zemsky, CEO and Founder of Lexarius. “We build up from foundational skills like active listening and emotional intelligence to high-stakes competencies like leading AI adoption, post-merger integration and crisis decision making.” Zemsky brings over 15 years of leadership experience at INSEAD, where he served as Deputy Dean and Dean of Innovation.
Lexarius is now available to enterprise clients across Asia-Pacific, Europe, and the Middle East. It has also established an office in ADGM, Abu Dhabi.
Lexarius and its team can be contacted for more information at https://www.lexarius.com/
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