Bangladesh’s 10 Minute School, announces US$2 million in funding led by Sequoia India’s Surge
10 Minute School, Bangladesh’s largest learning app, has raised US$2 million of seed funding from Surge, Sequoia India’s rapid-scale up program. This investment makes 10 Minute School the first EdTech company in Bangladesh to secure funding from Surge. The tech startup plans to utilise these funds to invest in product, technology, and talent acquisition across both Bangladesh and India.
Founded by Ayman Sadiq and Abdullah Abyad Raied in 2015, 10 Minute School is on a mission to democratise education for all in Bangladesh. Access to quality teachers has been one of the longest-standing challenges for students across the country. Much of the development in education is still focused around the capital, Dhaka and a few major cities, resulting in poor education infrastructure for the rest of the country. Additionally, the best coaching centers and private tutors are not affordable to the mass student population due to socio-economic barriers.
This is where 10 Minute School comes in. This mobile-first online learning platform bridges the gap between aspiration and opportunities by offering up affordable, accessible and highly relevant educational content to 25 million school and college students, university admission test candidates, job-seekers, and people looking for specialised skills training. Approximately 7 percent of 10 Minute School’s audience is based in India.
Instead of serving an off-the-shelf product feature, the team constantly interacts with its students to understand their pain points in order to create tailor-made solutions. Students from classes 1-12 can advance their learning using resources like videos, mock exams, lecture sheets, and notes that have been developed by experts over the years. Those looking to upskill themselves in their careers have access to various courses such as Spoken English, Microsoft Excel and corporate training.
2021 marked a significant year of growth for 10 Minute School, with more than 9 million new learners joining the platforms, 8 million learning hours delivered, and another 17,000+ new videos added to its learning ecosystem. The app has recently surpassed 3 million users, making it the largest learning app in the country.
“We have experienced an unprecedented 12x business growth in our platform in 2021 during the pandemic, and our users have also commended the app and its learning content. Sequoia Capital India’s Surge joining us as our first investor has been a very rewarding experience for the team, further validating our vision for democratising access to high quality education for all in Bangladesh. We want to double down on our growth trajectory this year while creating an unparalleled learning experience for our students,” said Ayman Sadiq, Founder and CEO, 10 Minute School.
The pandemic has turbocharged online education in Bangladesh, with offline institutions and exams being put on hold since early 2020. To ensure that students could continue learning despite the lockdown, the company launched some of its first premium courses and books during this time.
Today the platform has 25,000+ classes and skills courses prepared by some of Bangladesh’s best instructors and professionals. It provides a personalised learning journey for students with the opportunity to test their learning from a bank of 50,000+ quizzes and additional resources like flashcards, audiobooks, and notes.
In the first quarter of 2022, the company plans to launch live coaching classes for students from classes 5-12, test paper courses for HSC and SSC examinees, complete admission and BCS programmes, a whole series of interactive academic books for classes 3-12 and 25 more sought-after upskilling courses.
10 Minute School sees an immense opportunity to help support the existing education system of the country, which has 43 million students today. The team also aspires to contribute to the upskilling of its significant youth population of 5 million, leading to increased employment and demographic dividends for the country.
10 Minute School is part of Surge’s sixth cohort of 20 companies that build fresher, smarter solutions to help consumers and businesses adapt to a changing world.
The company was founded in July 2015 in Bangladesh by Ayman Sadiq, a globally recognised educator with a number of national and international awards under his belt. Ayman laid the groundwork for 10 Minute School in 2014 when he started making free online videos that went viral. Abdullah Raied, a second-time founder passionate about sustainable products, joined as co-founder in 2021. He was part of an industrial automation startup that created a data-driven farming ecosystem in Bangladesh. 10 Minute School is looking to hire passionate, mission-driven tech and product experts in Bangladesh and India, to join them in this journey of transforming the country’s education ecosystem.
