SplashLearn game-based edtech platform

SplashLearn, a 10-year-old U.S.-headquartered edtech startup that teaches children through a game-based curriculum, has raised $18 million during a new financing round because it looks to expand to more markets.

Owl Ventures a San Francisco-based company participated in the Series C funding round in SplashLearn, and Accel, which had earlier invested $7 million within the startup’s Series B, also participated within the new round.

In an interview with TechCrunch, SplashLearn co-founder and chief executive Arpit Jain said one among the most important hurdles the education system faces today is that youngsters don’t wish to find out, so you’ve got to broach the topic during a way they find engaging.

This platform offers math and reading courses to students in pre-kindergarten to grade five. The platform is developed, with guidance from teachers and other experts, over 4,000 games and other interactive activities to describe various concepts to the youngsters.

Jain showed an adventure game that was riddled with hurdles during a trial. A child needed to visually apply the concept of addition to progress forward within the game. Jain said that when the youngsters starts participating, there’s improvement in their learning outcome.

Jain said that SplashLearn’s platform provides 15 to twenty minutes of customized learning experience to every student per day.

The startup charges $12 a month to oldsters for its service. Alternatively, the service is free for schools. Currently, one in every three schools within the us uses SplashLearn, Jain said.

“One of our goals has been to form quality education available to students for free of charge. Our business model has enabled us to figure on this,” he said. SplashLearn doesn’t reach bent schools, he said. Teachers use our platform, and if they just like the offering, they create the case for wider adoption at the school, said Jain, who just like the other three co-founders, is alumni of IIT Kharagpur.

The team first created an edtech platform that was almost like what Coursera has evolved into over the past decade. But their previous venture did not gain traction because the Indian market, which had fewer than 50 million internet users then, wasn’t ready for it, said Jain.

SplashLearn today caters to quite 40 million registered students on its platform, 10 million of whom joined last year because the coronavirus shut schools worldwide. quite 750,000 teachers have also joined the platform.

The startup is currently largely serving students within the US, which accounts for 80% of its revenue. Students from over 150 other platforms including the U.K., Australia, Canada and India use this platform today.

“SplashLearn is well poised to cause a definite change within the digital learning space with its unique blend of scientifically designed curriculum and its pedagogical methods with global appeal. SplashLearn fits into our objective of supporting innovative companies within the edtech space, helping drive a paradigm shift within the way education is imparted, bringing it to scale,” said Amit A. Patel, director, Owl Ventures, during a statement. Patel is joining SplashLearn’s board alongside Abhinav Chaturvedi, a partner at Accel.