Pakistani startup launches exam prep app, gets $320,000 pre-seed funding

Edkasa, a Lahore-based education technology startup has managed to raise pre-seed funding of $320,000 to help launch a new mobile application for exam preparation, the company said on Tuesday.

The new app will leverage and make use of Edkasa’s existing userbase of 55,000 students and more than 40 schools throughout Pakistan which currently avail its services, according to a statement from the startup.

The company says it has already helped thousands of students, and recorded over 1.3 million hours of viewing time with over 250,000 queries answered by its teachers in 2020.

Edkasa raised the funding in a pre-seed round led by i2i Ventures, with participation from Walled City Co, Zayn Capital and strategic angels in Southeast Asia. The investment was made to build out the exam prep app and scale Edkasa’s e-learning impact with students across the country, the statement said.

“The new mobile application features an initial quiz to gauge a student’s requirements, and then offers customised studying paths based on their needs such as a specific exam, subject, or exam board,” according to the company.

It added that students could view on-demand video lectures and access quizzes based on past papers as well as compare their rankings on the app’s leaderboard.

Students sign up for the app for free and can continue to avail its services with a monthly subscription fee which gives them access to Edkasa’s learning materials across various subjects.

“The Edkasa app has been designed with feedback from Edkasa’s pre-existing user base, and is also aimed at countering the effects of school closure and an uncertain learning environment due to Covid-19,” said the press release.

It also noted that the app launch was geared towards helping Pakistan resolve the issue of access to quality education for over 14 million secondary and higher secondary students, a hurdle that leads to poor exam performance of over half of those who appear in standardised examinations across the country.

“Education is the biggest bridge between the world that we have, and the world that we want,” said Annum Sadiq, co-founder of Edkasa along with Fahad Tanveer. “Edkasa is a dream coming to fruition, as we prepare to educate millions of Pakistani learners.”

Sadiq is a Lahore University of Management Sciences (Lums) alumnus and Fulbright Scholar who co-founded Edkasa in 2017 with Tanveer — a Lums and Harvard alumnus.

Its chief technology officer, Muneeb Ali, is also the founder and chief executive officer of OneByte — which works with pre-seed, early-stage, and growth-stage startups to help build their products.