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Edtech Firm Springboard Raises $11 Mn From Reach Capital, Others To Expand Operations

• Pearson Ventures, IFC, Costanoa Ventures, Learn Capital, and Blue Fog Capital also participated in funding round
• Springboard will invest funds in expanding operations, adding more courses, hire more employees
• Springboard has also partnered with US-based tech giant Microsoft

Aman Rawat

San Francisco and Bengaluru-based online edtech startup Springboard has raised $11 Mn in a post-Series-A funding round led by Reach Capital. Venture capital companies such as Pearson Ventures, International Finance Corporation (IFC), as well as its existing investors Costanoa Ventures, Learn Capital, and Blue Fog Capital also participated in the funding round.

With the recently raised funds, Springboard will expand its operations, add more courses, and bring more talent to the company. “We will use this funding to grow our Indian presence with more courses in design and software engineering and continue our expansion into additional geographies,” said Vivek Kumar, Springboard India’s managing director.

Though the current employee strength of the company stands at 130, Springboard plans to increase the headcount to over 200 in the next few quarters.

Springboard has also partnered with US-based tech giant Microsoft to train and provide jobs to 5,000 students in the analytics profession over the next three years through its new Data Analytics Career Track platform, which is co-developed by the tech company.

Further, in this partnership, Microsoft will provide educational content and access to its tools. On the other hand, Springboard will provide mentorship, support and career services.

Founded in 2013 by Gautam Tambay and Parul Gupta, Springboard is a workforce upskilling edtech startup that offers online courses and extensive mentor-based learning for early and mid-level professionals in data science, UX design, digital marketing, and other technology areas. The company has so far raised $20 Mn in funding.

Highlighting the need for upskilling of developers which comes in every three to five years, Kumar said that the company’s industry-designed programmes, combined with in-depth, one-on-one mentorship and career guidance, enable people to achieve their full potential.

The company claims to have enrolled over 14K students for its programmes worldwide. Notably, in 2019, the company has launched three new programmes for tech learners in India. “Springboard plans to grow its Indian presence with more courses in design and software engineering,” Kumar was quoted as saying.

Kumar further claimed that for its skilling courses, the company has so far maintained a 99.9% success rate in job guarantee programmes.

According to a report by Google and KPMG, the edtech market is expected to have a significant impact on the online education sector, which has the potential to touch $1.96 Bn by 2021 from $247 Mn at present.

The Indian education market is vast, complex, and has innumerable existing gaps. So, despite the proliferation of both Indian and foreign edtech companies, there is still enough scope to leverage the upskilling game.

In India, Springboard competes with startups such as Udacity, Coursera, Udemy, and Progate which are also leveraging their online platforms in helping tech employees upskill their skills and remain relevant to the changing times.

Source: https://inc42.com/buzz/springboard-raises-11-mn-from-reach-capital-others-to-expand-operations/

SPONSOR:  BetterU Education Corp. aims to provide access to quality education from around the world. The company plans to bridge the prevailing gap in the education and job industry and enhance the lives of its prospective learners by developing an integrated ecosystem. Click here for more information.

Can Better Internet Connectivity in India Give Education a Push?

• Leveraging internet connectivity, edtech apps are personalising practice sessions for millions of children
• Using advanced technology like artificial intelligence and machine learning, edtech apps study individual student behaviour

By: Zisshan Hayath

Let’s go back to the time when Facebook first made its entrance in India. Most people didn’t have computers at home – and they would end up travelling a few kilometres just to reach a cyber cafe and access social networks. Instant messages and emails received slower replies and even owning a mobile phone was a luxury for the youth. Cheap mobile data was unheard of.

In just a little over a decade, the scene in India is completely different. Every other person, especially in urban areas, has access to mobile phones and laptops. India has one of the cheapest mobile data plans in the world. This has revolutionised the way mobile phones are used, even perceived.

Today, mobile devices have gone beyond their primary role of interpersonal connectivity. Today, mobile devices are a mode of convenience, entertainment, consumerism and education.

Initially, the term e-learning was only used in the context of large scale MNCs helping their employees learn on the go by eliminating classrooms. In the span of a few years, of the 300 million school going students, several million have registered themselves on e-learning apps.

So how is internet connectivity helping Indian students learn better for better results?

Accessibility:

In a traditional learning setup, quality teachers, books, and infrastructure are only concentrated in metros and education hubs. With the internet becoming easily affordable, eLearning apps leverage this connectivity to ensure that every child in in the country has access to high-quality teachers. Using live classes, children can watch India’s best teachers explain complex concepts, ask questions, and get them answered in real-time.

Personalisation:

The teacher-student ratio in Indian classrooms is extremely skewed, with one teacher for about 30-35 students on average. This number gets worse in tier II and III cities. Due to this, teachers cannot give students any personal attention. They use a one-size-fits-all approach for every child, without considering their aptitude, grasping power, strengths, and weaknesses. Due to India’s vast population and weak infrastructure, it is a mammoth task to improve this.

However, this can be easily resolved using edtech. Leveraging internet connectivity, edtech apps are personalising practice sessions for millions of children. Using advanced technology like artificial intelligence and machine learning, edtech apps study individual student behaviour.

Using this data, they start every student’s practice at a level that they’re comfortable with. The difficulty of questions is then increased until the student meets their individual learning goals.

24×7 Instant Doubt Resolution:

One of the key hindrances in every student’s learning journey is doubts. In a classroom set up, students end up waiting for weeks, if not months until the teacher completes the syllabus and then organises doubt-solving sessions. The end result is that the student’s learning journey is affected and so is their understanding of not just the topic in question, but other topics as well. They end up rote learning these topics, but this does not help when they appear for national level board or competitive exams.

Using internet connectivity, learning apps have created a chat platform where students can ask their questions. They are instantly connected to an expert who resolves their doubt for them in under a minute.

In fact, this platform, often called Live Doubts or Doubts on Chat has become so popular, that edtech apps are using natural language processing to create a bot that can answer student doubts instantly, based on the millions of questions asked earlier. If the bot cannot find an answer, or if the student has any further questions, the student can choose to chat with a live expert. As of now, over 25 percent of all doubts are solved using this bot.

Internet is bringing a revolution in every industry across India. From booking a cab to movie tickets, groceries, and games – every industry has undergone a major shift for the better. It’s now time for parents to embrace edtech and help their children learn better.

(Zishaan Hayath is the Founder and CEO of Toppr, a learning app that provides personalised learning for students studying for boards, Olympiads, and various engineering and medical competitive exams.) Chennai: In little over 3 months since video platform Tiktok ..

Read more at:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/72553189.cms?utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst

SPONSOR:  BetterU Education Corp. aims to provide access to quality education from around the world. The company plans to bridge the prevailing gap in the education and job industry and enhance the lives of its prospective learners by developing an integrated ecosystem. Click here for more information.

EdTech Platform Vedantu Raises $11M Led by Omidyar Network with Participation from Accel & Others

Round led by Omidyar Network with participation from Accel & overseas Education conglomerate

• Vedantu, an EdTech platform and pioneer of the ‘live online, interactive’ class has raised funds of $11 million (INR 79 crores)
• company’s proprietary technology platform allows interaction between the student and the teacher via an online whiteboard and an audio and video environment.

By: inventiva

Vedantu, an EdTech platform and pioneer of the ‘live online, interactive’ class has raised funds of $11 million (INR 79 crores). The company’s proprietary technology platform allows interaction between the student and the teacher via an online whiteboard and an audio and video environment. Students also access content, take assessments and get their learning report on the platform. Vedantu aims to deploy the majority of these funds for further technology development to create a more personalized LIVE learning experience for students and to develop its Student App.

Vedantu started operations in 2015 and has currently completed 800,000 hours of LIVE classes with a student base of 40,000 from grades 4 to 12 (for CBSE & ICSE Boards) and works with 500 teachers. The teachers who are chosen after a rigorous selection process are spread over 80 cities. Each tutor must maintain a high rating from students to continue teaching.

According to a report by Google and KPMG, the online education industry in India is poised to grow eight times to become a $1.96 billion industry by 2021 as an increasing number of students consume content through e-routes. In this segment, primary, secondary and supplemental education is likely to see the highest uptake and paid user base is estimated to touch 9.6 Mn users in 2021.

According to Vamsi Krishna, Vedantu CEO and Co-Founder, “Our aim at Vedantu has always been to reimagine and improve the way teaching and learning have been happening for decades. Today on Vedantu, thousands of students from all across the world study virtually with teachers, who are located far away from them. By using technology tools, data and AI, we are not just connecting these students to amazing teachers, but we are able to create a superior learning experience for students and aid in their outcome improvement, which is unlike any offline experience. Teaching and learning are set to transform at a rapid pace and our mission at Vedantu is to accelerate these transformations.”

Siddharth Nautiyal, investment partner, Omidyar Network said, “The lowering data costs and availability of high speed internet is making the online teaching model a reality. Vedantu’s one-to-many live classes  are disrupting the market while providing students a meaningful learning experience through ‘star’ teachers and an AI-powered platform to students in over 400 cities. We are excited about our partnership with Vedantu as they build a solution for the next half billion Indians who are coming online for the first time.”

“As one of the early starters, Vedantu is a category defining company in online LIVE tutoring. Their constantly evolving tech platform combines the best of teaching & learning experience making education accessible, affordable and impactful. We are committed to Vedantu’s vision & excited to be a catalyst in this journey”, added Anand Daniel, Accel Partners.

Source: https://www.inventiva.co.in/stories/inventiva/edtech-platform-vedantu-raises-11m-led-by-omidyar-network-with-participation-from-accel-others/

SPONSOR:  BetterU Education Corp. aims to provide access to quality education from around the world. The company plans to bridge the prevailing gap in the education and job industry and enhance the lives of its prospective learners by developing an integrated ecosystem. Click here for more information.

How to address India’s unemployability problem?

• According to a report by KPMG and Google, the Indian edtech market is pegged to touch $1.96 billion by 2021.

Neernidhi Samtani

“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”– Nelson Mandela

But how is one supposed to change the world if provided with outdated education?
How is one supposed to even progress if not provided with the platform to change the world after taking the education?

This is the state youth find themselves rather consistently. No, I’m not talking about Senegal or Syria. I’m talking about India which is not just largely unemployed but unemployable.

The unemployability problem

Let’s understand the difference first. Unemployability essentially means that even if there were available jobs, companies wouldn’t hire the student because he is largely substandard and lack skills worth paying for. Unemployability emerges from a wide gap between the level of student’s skills and knowledge resulting from his college education and in the level of what market demands.

The distressing growing number of educated youth (age 15-29) who are “Not in Employment, Education or Training (NEET)” had increased to 115 million in 2017-18 from 70 million in 2004-5 points to growing “unemployability” depicting a significant problem with education in India.

From my experience in educating students over the past 8 years I have gathered, after graduating most students from Tier 2 & Tier 3 colleges wander in metro cities learning about the market realizing the massive gap in their knowledge and market demand, taking a few short-term courses (computer & communication skills), going for some walk-in interviews and finally settle for anything they can find. This period ranges approximately from 1.5 to 2 years after college.

The “National Employability Report – Engineers 2016” (NERE), by Aspiring Minds, an employment assessment organization found out that nearly 80% of the graduating engineers are unemployable. The above figures reinforce the fact that only 20 per cent of the five million students who graduate every year get employed in India according to the Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (ASSOCHAM).

CP Gurnani, CEO & MD of Tech Mahindra resonates with the above findings in an interview given to TOI, “The top 10 IT companies take only 6% of the engineering graduates. What happens to the remaining 94%? If you come to Tech Mahindra, I have created a five-acre tech & learning center. For learnability, skill development and being ready for the market, the onus is now shifting onto the industry.”

Reasons behind unemployability

During all the razzmatazz in the post-liberalisation era while the “mass recruiters” propelled the service economy at the rate of 9% annually, AICTE approved engineering institutes grew to 10,396 in 2018 from a mere 337 in 1991.

But as with every fairy tale, bubbles burst, realities change and supply becomes more than the demand.

Careers started going for a toss and unemployability becomes a two-fold problem in India:

1. Student Mindset: Many are living a myth: getting into a college is the door to a great career.

They fail to seek meaningful advice from the right stakeholders and not just with peers who still believe in the myth of “engineering royalty”.

Only 3.84 per cent of engineers in the country have the technical, cognitive and linguistic skills required for software-related jobs in startups. A recent study by the University of Exeter in the UK listed skills like communication, problem-solving, being self-motivated, organizational, team spirit, adaptability, negotiation as inevitable to the hiring process. Students from Tier 2 & Tier 3 fall short in these parameters in a considerable way and rarely strive to learn these.

Apart from a lack of internships, engineers also have low employability because only 36 per cent do projects beyond their curriculum.

2. Outdated Curriculum and Reluctant Colleges: Student attendance writing assignments are given a priority rather than acquiring expert faculty.

Colleges are not able to upgrade and keep up with the pace of advancement in the market in terms of curriculum and expert faculty. The jobs of the glorified past are becoming redundant. Though the demand for skills like artificial intelligence, machine learning, data science, digital marketing and mobile development has been shooting up, only 3 per cent of engineers have these new-age technological skills.

Only 40 per cent of engineering graduates do an internship, while a mere 7 per cent of students do multiple internships and colleges play little or no part in the procurement.

The subjects are taught in a very theoretical manner. Whereas 60 per cent of faculty doesn’t talk about the application of concepts in the industry, only 47 per cent of the engineers attend any industry talk.

Employability vs Employment (NERE)

Employable	Got an Interview Opportunity	Reached Final Round	Employed	Average Salary
19.11 %	72.64 %	51.66 %	19.91 %	3,13,000

Possible solutions

After the IT services and engineering institutes revolution, India saw a third revolution- Start-ups.

According to a report by KPMG and Google, the Indian edtech market is pegged to touch $1.96 billion by 2021.

The best possible solutions to the unemployability problem can be obtained through strategic partnerships and collaborations between Startups, Institutes and Industry.

Startups have a better chance of solving these challenges simply because they have the ability to aggregate and accelerate. When all these stakeholders work as a team with a focus on employability to offer industry-oriented quality education, which can advance as quickly as the technology it can bring about a paradigm shift in mainstream education:

Student Awareness: Students need to learn that one-time education (degrees) will neither guarantee them jobs nor will last through entire working career. Companies are shifting from hiring based on credentials to hiring based on a candidate’s portfolio/projects and experience.

Institute collaborations EdTech startups can collaborate with institutes which provide infrastructure and accreditations keeping the business models “asset light”. Startups can either take the on-campus “Bootcamps” way (E.g. PESTO) providing 2-6 months- coding, soft skills, mock interviews, workshops, industry talks and new age technology courses along with placements in internships or the full take-over way (E.g. Sunstone Eduversity) where the responsibilities for admissions, academics (program design, curriculum, and pedagogy), and placements are presided completely by the startup.

Industry collaborations Startups can diligently make industry collaborations with industry experts and stalwarts for helping prepare a better curriculum in resonance with current market scenario and bringing industry leaders as expert faculty on-board(can be a mix of online-offline lectures) which would help students understand market demands. Collaborations should focus on providing hands-on experience in terms of internships. Placing these students is easier because of trust due to industry collaborations.

Certification Collaborations Institutes or startups can collaborate with other strategic partners like foreign universities and renowned private education companies using their industry-oriented curriculums and opening up new avenues like digital marketing, AI & ML, big data, cloud computing, etc.

We need change. We need it now. We need it at a pace which can only be achieved through strategic collaborations. We need dozens of such startups to keep with the pace of technology advancements. DISCLAIMER : Views expressed above are the author’s own.   Source: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/blogs/the-growth-catalyst/how-to-address-indias-unemployability-problem/

SPONSOR:  BetterU Education Corp. aims to provide access to quality education from around the world. The company plans to bridge the prevailing gap in the education and job industry and enhance the lives of its prospective learners by developing an integrated ecosystem. Click here for more information.

Edtech Startup Digital Gurukul Rolls Out #Blockchain – Powered Diplomas

• The startup has partnered with Germany-based Certif-ID
• Receivers would not need additional devices to view the diploma
• The company was in talks to raise $5 Mn for 10% stake

Indore-based Edtech startup, Digital Gurukul, has partnered with German tech networking company Certif-ID to roll out blockchain-powered certificates and Will allow employers to access the diplomas of applicants from any geographical locations.

By integrating blockchain with certificates and diplomas, Digital Gurukul is eliminating the need to send or physically present degrees. The people receiving these diplomas would not require any additional software or special equipment. The parties can simply view the diploma by scanning the QR code which is printed on the certificate.

All the students graduating from Digital Gurukul will not be provided with the blockchain-powered diploma to make the job and college hunting much simpler and seamless. The diploma will include information like educational qualifications, portfolio, projects and attendance. Dr. Raj Padhiyar, director of Digital Gurukul, said the adoption of Blockchain Technology is still in its infancy in the education industry. “But we believe it can help make the Indian education system more dependable and trustworthy,” he added.

Founded in 2014 by Padhiyar, Digital Gurukul has been awarded the “Asia’s Best Digital Marketing Institute”​. The company educates students regarding digital marketing and its various aspects. Digital Gurukul aims to have trained over 6K students by March 2020, which also includes some prominent names like Wittyfeed cofounder Parveen Singhal and Renaissance Indira Group of Institute’s founder chairman Swapnil Kothari.

In August 2019, Digital Gurukul announced that it was in talks with some investors to raise $5 Mn for a 10% stake. The company planned to use the funding to expand its operations to over 40 offline learning centres, invest in content and programmes and aid its international expansion.

The company’s official statement also added that it is planning to venture into the Middle East and Southeast Asian markets. The company, in its previous press release, also claimed that it has received over 120 franchisee requests across Asia. Digital Gurukul also has associations with reputed Indian institutes like IIM Indore, IIT Indore, NMIMS and Welingkar Institute, among others.

According to DataLabs by Inc42, Indian edtech startups received a funding of approximately $700 Mn in 2018, noting an 85% hike from the $375 Mn funding raised in 2017. Interestingly, of the $375 Mn raised, BYJU’s had raised $230 Mn in 2017.

The report also notes that only 7% of the 3,500 startups operating in the edtech space are funded, as of 2018. The Datalabs by Inc42 also highlights that 182 edtech startups generated funding of $1.34 Bn between 2014 to 2018. Of these, only 52 startups, making up for 28.5%, received more than $1 Mn in funding which amounts to $1.3 Bn. Meaning that the 52 startups comprised  99% of the total funding in the period.

Source: https://inc42.com/buzz/edtech-startups-digital-gurukul-rolls-out-blockchain-powered-diplomas/

SPONSOR:  BetterU Education Corp. aims to provide access to quality education from around the world. The company plans to bridge the prevailing gap in the education and job industry and enhance the lives of its prospective learners by developing an integrated ecosystem. Click here for more information.

Indian Edtech stands to unlock immense growth

• Recent research suggests that the global Edtech market is expected to grow to USD 341 bn by 2025.
• Armed with massive opportunities and ideas, global leaders in the Edtech sector recently came together at the 2019 Global Education Summit (GES) in Beijing.

Hans News Service

New Delhi: As the global education ecosystem continues to grow and evolve at a rapid pace, the space has witnessed an increase in the number of Ed-tech players. Recent research suggests that the global Edtech market is expected to grow to USD 341 bn by 2025. Armed with massive opportunities and ideas, global leaders in the Edtech sector recently came together at the 2019 Global Education Summit (GES) in Beijing. The summit revolved around exploring effective solutions from diverse perspectives, centered on the theme “Education for All”.

Representing India were top Edtech players, Gradeup, Toppr and Vedantu, who shared key insights on the test preparation and tutoring markets for competitive exams in the country. Also Read – Rajya Sabha passes bill to amend SPG Act, Amit Shah rejects charge of political vendetta, Congress stages walkout China, which is the leader in the Edtech space, has made significant strides by specifically focusing on student success and effective tools for measuring learning outcomes.

Chinese Edtech companies witness tremendous growth every year due to improvements in sales and recruitment process, teacher’s training and technological upgrades relevant to their offerings. By the end of 2019, the Chinese Edtech market is expected to reach 41 billion, growing at a rate of 20% annually. Also Read – Rajnath warns BJP MPs of Modi’s dissatisfaction with absenteeism in Parliament.

India, the Edtech market is expected to reach 1.96 billion by 2021, with test preparation being the fastest growing category with a CAGR of 64%. The current numbers are an indication that there is a lot to do and learn for Indian Edtech players from the Chinese. Sharing his insights, on the gap in Edtech markets in both countries, Shobhit Bhatnagar, Co-founder–CEO, Gradeup said, “With a focus on student outcomes, Chinese Live tutoring players have successfully been able to scale and innovate over the last 3 years. There is a lot that the Indian Edtech landscape can learn from this. This exchange has only reinforced Gradeup’s commitment towards further driving live online classes and strengthening our technology and product. We also plan to intensify our focus on Student Success in order to ensure greater efficacy of learning outcomes.”

The 2019 Global Education Summit saw the participation of over 200 representatives from the education, political and business sectors sharing their insights on the future-oriented development of education. The key focus was on facilitating greater inclusivity and equal access to education.  

The development of the Edtech market in India and the success of existing players will be largely driven by their focus on Live tutoring, with student success and learning outcomes at the very core. Shaping and realigning their delivery of Edtech content in a manner that is tailor-made and suited to the country’s continuously evolving educational landscape is the need of the hour. It will propel the growth of the sector in the future, and further boost the goal of democratized access to quality education for students pan-India. Gradeup is India’s largest exam preparation destination. It helps more than 15 million students prepare for various exams & score better. Established in 2015, it recently received $7 million in Series A funding from Times Internet and total funding amounts to $10 million.

Source: https://www.thehansindia.com/hans/young-hans/new-delhi-indian-edtech-stands-to-unlock-immense-growth–586588