As per a survey conducted by HSBC, more than 51% of parents in India are obsessed with their child’s education. With education being a prime goal for most in India, it is not surprising that Indian EdTech startups will face a tremendous growth in 2018. To meet the preference needs of parents and students, the education concepts are also changing. EdTech startups are using modern methods to revolutionize tuitions and coaching tactics. For example, tuition jobs demand professionals with a higher degree (click here to sign up as a tutor).
While some startups offer better coaching in their respective domain, some are aimed at cracking entrance level exams. Let us get inspired by following Indian startups that have gained name and fame through their unique methods.
- BYJU’s, The learning app:
Mr. Byju Raveendran founded the BYJU app in the year 2008. It was aimed at providing training for the preparation of different competitive exams like IAS, JEE, and CAT. Since then, it also provides curriculum supplements from class 6 to 12. It has brought in some unique features of learning through videos and interactive sessions. In 2016, it touched 5.5 million downloads with 2.5 lakhs paid subscribers.
- Meritnation, School made easy:
Mr. Pavan Chauhan launched Meritnation in the year 2009. It is a kind of an online portal for students up to class 12 and includes a curriculum of state boards like CBSE and ICSE. It has features for conducting regular tests and assignments to check the preparedness level of students. The app has successfully gained 5 million downloads from 95 lakh users.
- CultureAlley, Language Learning:
The website came into existence for those who want to learn new languages in an easy way. The founder of this website is the husband-wife duo, Nishant Patni, and Pranshu Bhandari. Pransh states, “Over 1 billion people in the world is trying to learn a foreign language every year”. Learning a new language can be a tough job but this website makes it easy with its interesting methods and robust search. It has gained popularity from about 5 lakh learners around the world.
- Simplilearn, Get Certified Get Ahead:
Launched in 2009 by Krishna Kumar, Simplilearn is an online portal aiming to simplify learning process for professionals across various sectors. It offers more than 400 vivid courses in the field of IT, programming, digital marketing and more. As the tagline suggests, you even get a certificate which is recognized for the course that you undertake. About 5 lakh users have been certified in various courses through this portal.
Looking at the above list, we can say that technology is changing at a pace faster than ever assumed. The education sector is embracing the change and taking advantage of new technologies available in the market.
Not only in the education sector, technology has played its role in several such sectors in Indian startup ecosystem. According to NASSCOM, India is the 4th largest base for startups in the world. But what makes it so large? We’ll understand it through the trends that will define Indian ecosystem in 2018:
1. Fintech will continue to deepen its roots and attract more money than ever.
2. Consumer behavior will change for good. It will prove that consumers in India prefer quality over discounts.
3. Hyperlocal businesses like grocery and food delivery will make a comeback.
4. The Indian economy will see a rise. An 8% GDP growth is expected and more startups will benefit from it. If not in terms of revenue than in terms of raising the bar for capital.
5. There will be a huge rise in data and smartphones. All thanks to Jio, Xiomi, Whatsapp, Facebook, and Google.
6. India is a brand starved country. The sectors like food and fashion will introduce new brands in the market.
7. With the explosion of data usage and increased data speeds, India’s digital world is going to face a revolution. Though consumers are still learning to pay through apps and paying for digital content is still far away, consumer presence is there. It will increase in near future.
8. Agri-tech will see growth as the farmer market will be more open to business due to the internet and smartphone access.
9. Indian startups will go IPO in 2018. In 2017, there were some IPO exits which were small in size but really big in cash. This will force actions for profit with moderate IPO growth.
The year 2018 will mark a remarkable year for startups as the startups will scale up. As discussed above, it will be a fruitful year for Indian Edtech startups as well. So what is the thing that is preventing it to happen? Why are education startups failing? Let’s dig deep into this.
If you are an Edtech entrepreneur, here are some common mistakes you should avoid for failing miserably:
- Understanding education ecosystem partially:
Unless you have worked with a public education system, there is no way to find out the school challenges.
- Lack of critical teacher input:
One of the reasons a startup fails is the lack of information from a knowledgeable teacher. It is necessary to have an educator included in your team.
- Lack of educational promotion:
Promotion done improperly will lead to demise. For a strong promotion, create good educational content on blogs, indulge in Twitter and Facebook chats. Build organic relations with talented educators through promotions like tuition jobs.
Of all these, finding a right educator for your startup is critical. But how can you find one? Here’s a list of platforms to search out for right educator:
- Conferences: Conferences tend to attract a lot of tech-savvy teachers actively looking for tuition jobs.
- Local meetups: Meetups not only attract tutors seeking for tuition jobs but also new entrepreneurs.
- Social Media: Social Media is the best platform to search for educators seeking tuition jobs like Twitter, Tumblr, Pinterest and many more.
- Edcamps: Edcamps is a great way to look out for tuition jobs seeker. But Edcamps is also a platform to build relationships with other educators and startup entrepreneurs.