Finding tutor online made easy

Finding a good home tutor is always a tough task. Bengaluru-based education technology start-up flipClass is striving to make it easy for parents.

Founded in 2013, it acts as a marketplace where students from Kindergarten to Class 12 can find a suitable expert as home tutor. Its flipLearn technology helps improve the learning process through continuous monitoring. The firm claims it has the toughest filter while selecting tutors. These include verification of prowess on the subject, psychometric test, interview and verification of documents. Only eight per cent pass all the tests.

flipClass has operations in Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Delhi, connecting around 4,200 students and 11,000 tutors. Almost 90 per cent of the classes are physical home tuition, after which a student can take an online test on flipLearn, which would suggest the teacher and the areas where she needs improvement. It also has a platform for online classes.

In July, 2014, the company received $250,000 from a Singapore-based investor and other individual investors. In March this year, it raised $1 million from Blume Ventures and S Chand and Co, a publishing house. "We will be using the funds to improve the technology, including flipLearn that we launched a few months ago, and also to automate the search," said Vineet Dwivedi, founder and chief executive officer. These initiatives are expected to be in place in six months. The firm also plans to expand to Mumbai, Pune and Chennai. It is targeting 20,000 students and 25,000 tutors by 2016.

Brand plays a major role and creating one would be a major challenge, it says. Another challenge would be maintaining the quality while scaling up. The company is confident of meeting these challenges with the support of technology and its stringent filtering process