Educational tech start-ups look to up products bouquet

The company also plans to offer it to more schools by expanding into more towns

Funtoot, a Bengaluru-based education technology start-up which has developed artificial intelligent digital trainer, is looking to expand its bouquet of offerings in order to expand its reach and cover more subjects. The company which already offers its learning solutions to around 50,000 students from some 120 schools across 50 towns, is also planning to offer it to more schools by expanding into more towns.

Founded by three technology professionals in 2010, Funtoot has developed artificial intelligence trainer which works as an adaptive, personalised, automatic digital tutor for the child based on his/her capacity. “Funtoot is an empowering tool that helps the teacher pay more individualised attention to students,’ said Rajeev Pathak, chief executive officer and co-founder of the company.

The company offers its digital learning solutions on science for students from the second to fifth grade, while for mathematics it is already offered to students belonging to second to ninth grade. According to Pathak, their immediate goal is to develop the tool for science students from grade two to nine.

“Discovery learning is one aspect that Funtoot focuses on. For instance, a student is being taught mathematics and he/she is interested in cricket, then the tool uses cricket-based examples and contexts, so that the individual understands it better and makes it interesting to learn.” The subscription charges for Funtoot learning solution vary between Rs 1,800 to Rs 3,000 per student per year.

Similarly, another Bengaluru-based start-up Experifun Learning Solutions, which has developed science gadgets for easy and fun learning, plans to add more products to its kitty. The company has developed a box of tools, Caboodle, which contains various gadgets covering various science topics and help teachers conduct experiments in the classroom.

Currently, Experifun is deployed in about 100 schools across 10 states. Started in 2013, the company also has a presence in Philippines and Nigeria.

The products developed by Experifun look very similar to the science exhibits students are familiar with at school exhibitions. These are devices that do not require a very detailed guidance to use. For instance, there is a tool that shows how photosynthesis takes place. Once the device is attached to a leaf in day-light, the light on the device starts blinking.

The rate of blinking is directly proportional to the rate at which photosynthesis takes place in the leaf. “The schools, which use Caboodle devices, often get back and urge us to develop more products in specific areas,” said Vivek Pandey, one of the co-founder.

Experifun is funded by Pearson Affordable Learning Fund (PLAF), an education fund run by UK-based education company Pearson.

Interest in education-based start-ups are on a rise in India as well as across the globe.

According to Edtechreview portal, the education technology segment attracted over $2.3 billion in investment globally in 2014.