Y Combinator is a startup accelerator that invests in a large number of startups twice a year. It created a new model for funding startups. Twice a year, the company invests a small amount of money ($150k) in a large number of startups. The startup accelerator works intensively with the companies for three months, to get them into the best possible shape and refine their pitch to investors. Each cycle culminates in Demo Day when the startups present their companies to a carefully selected, invite-only audience.

Y Combinator

Benson Oak Ventures (“BOV”) is a buy-out and growth equity investment firm. Backed by a deep pool of international investors, BOC focuses on leading small to medium-size enterprises based in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Based in Prague, the firm’s investment professionals combine for more than 50 years of experience on the Czech and Slovak markets. Benson Oak s.r.o. was founded by Gabriel Eichler in 1991, and now acts exclusively as the advisor to BOC on both domestic and international acquisitions. Its advisory experience on the Czech and Slovak markets includes over 70 completed debt-raising and M&A transactions worth more than €6 billion, giving BOC unparalleled access to the highest ranks of local banks, government and corporate leaders. Since 2001, BOC has invested over €50 million across a variety of industries. Their position on the market allows us to source deals before they become public, leading to closer relationships with the companies they invest in and more aligned incentives. Once completed, they actively participate in each investment, helping to guide their portfolio companies from the early stages of strategic development through exit. Their principle goal as an organization is to invest in high quality businesses and provide those companies with the support necessary to reach new levels of performance. By adding a human element to the financial discipline they bring to each investment, they move beyond the purely monetary facets of their business and instead create true value for both their investors and the community they live in.

Benson Oak Ventures

Emerge is a $70m pre-seed fund backed by 100+ of the world’s best edtech and future of work founders and executives. Our vision is to democratise access to opportunity by being a catalytic partner for early-stage founders re-designing the future of learning and work.

Emerge

fresh.fund is an Israeli pre-seed venture capital fund investing in early-stage startups across segments and verticals.We're built to partner with early-stage founders from day one, often as the company's first institutional investors. Our model is refreshingly simple: up to $300,000 in pre-seed funding within <4 weeks and follow-on capital as necessary. Check out our portfolio here >> https://www.fresh.fund/portfolio. It's never too early to have a conversation about your startup.

fresh.fund

Elevate Education is an educational Platform.

Elevate Education

Tailor-ED

Tailor-ED allows teachers to provide an engaging and effective learning experiences for students. It creates learning experiences to the needs of the teacher and each and every student. For us, creating engaging and effective learning experiences is about first seeing and supporting the whole learner. The company builds learning experiences that merge proficiency with collaboration, creativity and other SEL skills to meet the needs of the student. Tailor-ED is headquartered in San Francisco, California.

Founded in 2018 by Maayan Yavne and Yael Haramaty, Tailor-ED is the developer of a personalized learning platform for math and English language arts (ELA) education. The company provides a proprietary software solution to educators that enables them to create short assessments to gain insight into both the social-emotional and academic needs of students, and receive recommendations on the most effective educational resources for each student and for each lesson using AI. Additionally, the company launched the Exit Ticket Builder and Smart Resource Library in September 2021 in time for the new school year. The Smart Resource Library will include content from over 40 Tailor-ED content partners as well as other content providers. As of September 2021, the platform served over 100,000 students in more than 1,500 schools globally, 70 of which subscribed to the service.

Remote learning is driving an education technology revolution.

EdTech: K-12

Tailor-ED Raises $1.6 Million to Bring Differentiated OER to More Students

Founded in 2018 by Maayan Yavne and Yael Haramaty, Tailor-ED is the developer of a personalized learning platform for math and English language arts (ELA) education. The company provides a proprietary software solution to educators that enables them to create short assessments to gain insight into both the social-emotional and academic needs of students, and receive recommendations on the most effective educational resources for each student and for each lesson using AI. Additionally, the company launched the Exit Ticket Builder and Smart Resource Library in September 2021 in time for the new school year. The Smart Resource Library will include content from over 40 Tailor-ED content partners as well as other content providers. As of September 2021, the platform served over 100,000 students in more than 1,500 schools globally, 70 of which subscribed to the service.In October 2019, the company raised USD 1.6 million in a seed funding round led by Benson Oak Ventures with plans to use the funding to hire business development and sales staff, add ELA resources to the platform, and build more partnerships with content publishers. In September 2021, the company closed an extended seed round led by Israel - Colorado Innovation Fund and Lucas Venture Group. The funds raised through this extended round, while not being disclosed, will be used to finance the scaling of the company’s online education platform.

Founded in 2016, BookNook is an online literacy platform designed for learners in grades 1-5. Partnering with school districts and non-profit organizations, the company focuses on human-to-human learning and works with children one-on-one or in small groups, enabling it to gather rich, observational data. As of June 2021, the company partnered with hundreds of schools, school districts, and non-profits across 35 states.BookNook differs from other digital literacy tools by not requiring students to take formative assessments to check for their understanding. Rather, the platform lets teachers record qualitative data on oral fluency, such as whether a student pauses at punctuation marks as they read aloud, or reads in set phrases. Students can also record self-reflections on the platform.In June 2021, the company partnered with MIND Research Institute, a neuroscience and education social impact organization and creator of the PreK-8 visual instructional program ST Math, to deliver a High Dosage Tutoring program (HDT) for math to K-8 students to address unfinished learning. BookNook tutors will deliver tutoring sessions using the ST Math program over BookNook’s synchronous learning platform. The company launched a new teacher application portal at booknooktutor.com in October 2021, giving experienced teachers the opportunity to apply to become BookNook virtual tutors on its platform. BookNook intends to engage 10,000 virtual teachers to support 80,000 students by the end of the 2021-2022 school year.

BookNook

Story2 uses its proprietary Moments Method writing system, its StoryBuilder software, and live online group coaching to help high school students and professionals improve their writing, speaking, storytelling, and collaboration skills.The company aims to help different segments with their specific needs: students with college admission and scholarship essays, professionals preparing for interviews and creating cover letters, and business teams to improve sales, recruiting and company messaging through effective storytelling.Since 2013, Story2 has worked with more than 200,000 individuals in 21 countries with college admission essays, interview preparation, and pitching ideas. The company is expanding into China and India in 2020 and plans to focus on helping science and technology students improve their communication and leadership skills.

Story2

<div>
 
 Vooks offers a subscription-based, ad-free curated library of children's books converted to video with narration and some slow-paced animation, allowing children to read along while watching. Aimed at young children aged 6 months to 8 years, Vooks promotes reading aloud to develop fluency and comprehension. The company was founded by siblings Marshall Bex and Shannon Bex, and Russell Hirtzel, and is reportedly the first-ever streaming service for books with illustrations, read-along text and animations.
 
 
 In February 2020, Vooks raised USD 12 million in Series A funding; however, the investors and purpose of the funding were not disclosed. In November 2020, the company raised USD 21.9 million in equity investments from more than 30 investors.
 
 
 In November 2020, Vooks partnered with United Way of Metropolitan Dallas (UWMD), a community-based, nonprofit social change organization, and Atmos Energy, a natural gas distributor, to provide around 78,000 one-year Vooks subscriptions for children aged 3 to 6 and early education teachers in the Greater Dallas area. The program is funded by a USD 1 million contribution from Atmos Energy, and contributes to UWMD’s Aspire United 2030 education goal of increasing the number of North Texas students reading at grade level by third grade by 50%. Similarly, in March 2021, the company partnered with Reach Out and Read Of Greater New York (ROR GNY), a nonprofit organization of healthcare providers who promote early literacy. The partnership aims to provide more than 75,000 preschool children with one-year Vooks subscriptions starting in March 2021.
 
 
 In July 2021, it was reported that Vooks is offering its service to authors and producers as a way of quickly testing ideas with audiences through simple animated shorts. Thereby, Vooks expands its library of original content while authors and producers get real-time performance data.
 
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Vooks

Xeropan offers an AI-powered, game-based approach to learning English through 14 of the most widely-spoken languages. As of October 2020, the app had more than one million players.

Xeropan

<div>
 
 GoGuardian is a provider of student security software solutions to help educators identify learning patterns, protect students from harmful and distracting content, and support students at risk of self-harm and suicide. As of August 2021, the company had partnered with more than 10,000 schools in the US, covering more than 22 million students.  
 
 
 In November 2020, GoGuardian announced a 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/1863">
 merger with Pear Deck
 </a>
 to deepen the support provided to students and teachers and improve their in-class experience. Founded in 2014, Pear Deck is a student engagement platform that allows teachers to create, edit, and launch multimedia content and formative assessments on students' devices to increase student engagement. At the time of the merger, Pear Deck was used by 8 million educators and students in more than 17,000 schools worldwide. Pear Deck co-founder and Chief Educator, Michal Eynon-Lynch, will join the GoGuardian Board of Directors. In May 2022, the company acquired 
 <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/10683">
 TutorMe,
 </a>
 Zovio’s tutoring services business, for USD 55 million in cash to strengthen its product offering. 
 
 
 Funding and financials
 
 
 In August 2021, GoGuardian secured a USD 200 million investment from Tiger Global Management. The funds will be allocated for product innovation, talent acquisition, and business development. 
 
 
 
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GoGuardian

Businesses providing education delivery solutions such as learning management systems (LMS), and tech solutions for data analytics, administration, and other services to educational institutions.

Businesses delivering curriculum-based learning, particularly relating to science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education to educational institutions and individual students.

Mostly for-profit corporations running state-funded, tuition-free schools as an alternative to traditional public schools.

Businesses providing extra-curricular education relating to the arts, hobbies, and life skills, and entities providing college and career guidance.

Businesses delivering English language arts (ELA) education, and language learning and literacy support to educational institutions and individual students.

Platforms providing students with after-school tutoring support on an individual or group basis.

Businesses delivering early childhood education, special education, and social-emotional learning (SEL) programs to educational institutions and individual students.

Entities providing professional development resources and tools for teachers, and those providing testing and assessment solutions to educational institutions and educators.

Platforms providing student-parent-teacher-school communication and networking solutions, and those providing search, reference, and marketplace solutions.

Adaptive learning platforms, personalized learning plans, and AI-powered analytics provide insight into student performance

Learning platforms that promote an inclusive and equitable educational culture for underserved communities

Uses AI/ML to create personalized learning plans, adaptive learning platforms, and intelligent tutoring systems

Tailor-ED

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