Seoul-based edtech startup Mathpresso raised $50 million in a Series C funding round in June, which puts the company’s total funding at $105 million.
Taking part in the new round were Yellowdog, GGV Capital, Goodwater Capital, KDB, and SKS Private Equity. In addition to the four new investors, previous backers including SoftBank Ventures Asia, Legend Capital, Mirae Asset Venture Investment, and Smilegate Investment also participated.
The startup was founded in 2015 by co-CEOs Ray Lee and Jake Lee, and operates QANDA, a K-12 mobile learning app. In 2017, QANDA adopted an AI-based optical character recognition (OCR) scan that searches for answers in five seconds.
The service is now used by over 9.8 million users monthly from more than 50 different countries — a five times increase since 2020. Over 80% of QANDA’s users are now outside of Korea, with its strongest user bases include Japan, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Thailand.
Since the school lockdown in April, 2020, online learning emerged as a new form of education with the number of QANDA’s monthly active users surging by nearly five times.
Applying Korea’s advanced learning content and after-school tutoring system to the global market, Mathpresso plans to develop a multi-faceted education platform with personalised content catered to each user’s learning level.
The company also has ventured into offline and book publishing to optimise learning experience both online and offline. QANDA Study Center Vietnam partners with teachers to match them with students and publishes workbooks.
With its Series C investment, Mathpresso plans to strengthen its AI-based techniques of recommendation algorithms and develop localised business models for its regional offices in Indonesia and Thailand.
“Historically, quality education has been strictly available for the privileged few,” said Jake Lee, “In the future we vision, anyone should and will be able to access quality education built just for them.”
