Just a few hours ago, Udemy announced that Hugo Sarrazin, a 27-year McKinsey veteran, will replace CEO Greg Brown. Brown had served as CEO for almost two years after succeeding Gregg Coccari, who retired in early 2023.

This leadership change follows a similar pattern to Coursera, whose CEO recently “retired” and was replaced by an Amazon veteran.

No specific reason was given for this transition, but examining Udemy’s stock performance and future outlook provides context for the change.

For the past several years, Udemy Business has been the company’s primary growth engine, while Udemy Consumer has steadily declined from $326.4M in 2020 to $292.1M in 2024.

In 2020, Udemy Business represented just 24% of the company’s revenue; by 2024, it accounts for 62%, and in the most recent quarter (2024 Q4), this figure rose to 65%. The third quarter of 2022 marked a significant milestone when Udemy Business revenue first exceeded Udemy Consumer revenue.

Given the strategic importance of Udemy’s Business segment, it was unsurprising when Brown, who previously served as president of Udemy Business, was appointed CEO.

But in 2025, Udemy has projected a revenue growth of just 1%. The stock market hasn’t reacted kindly to Udemy. Since going public, the stock price is down by 70%

To boost its faltering stock price, Udemy employed the standard corporate playbook: layoffs and reorganization, stock buybacks, and paying creators less for their content.

In August 2024, Udemy announced a “Strategic Business Update” that used corporate euphemisms like “reallocating resources” and “reducing organizational layers” to describe what eventually became a 20% workforce reduction, with some positions relocated to “lower-cost geographies.”

This follows a previous round of layoffs in February 2023, when approximately 200 employees (10% of staff) were let go, a move that was expected to save the company $30-32 million annually.

Perhaps most controversially, Udemy implemented a significant reduction in instructor revenue sharing. In November 2023, the company announced plans to reduce the instructor share from 25% to 15% by 2026, with the first adjustment to a 20% share effective January 2024. While this boosted Udemy’s stock price by 50% initially, Class Central analysis shows that instructors received approximately $30 million less in 2024 than they would have under the previous revenue-sharing model.

The instructor payment cuts directly contradicted Udemy’s public claim that “total instructor payouts will equal or exceed their current levels each year” despite the reduced percentage. Instead, instructor earnings in 2024 regressed to 2022 levels, effectively erasing two years of growth for content creators.

Sarrazin comes to Udemy with no EdTech experience. His 27 years at McKinsey, a consulting firm known for recommending cost-cutting measures and efficiency improvements to its clients, suggests that Udemy’s approach to instructor payments and employee headcount is unlikely to become more generous under his leadership.

Since the announcement of a new CEO, Udemy’s stock has fallen by approximately 10%. At the time of publishing, Udemy’s market cap is $1.2B.

No CEO is safe in EdTech in 2025.