Novakid

Novakid is an international online school English for children 4-12 years old, with teachers of native speakers, using modern technologies, virtual reality a model of mass online role-playing games and personalizing the learning trajectory to achieve a high level of immersion and effective learning of the English language. Education in Novakid is an addition to the formal study of English in schools, allows children to learn practical skills in English from home with native language teachers and peers studying in Novakid from other countries.

Performance indicators

2020: Business growth by 500%

English The online language platform for children aged 4 to 12 years Novakid on January 27, 2021 announced the results of 2020, the growth of the company's business (customer size, bases revenue and net profit) exceeded 500%. In addition, at the end of the year, Novakid during two investment rounds attracted more than 5 million from US dollars investors from, both United States Asia for Europe product development and expansion to other regions.

2020 was a year of serious growth in key indicators. So, in 2020, more than 25 thousand new students registered in Novakid and the total number of company customers in 40 countries of the world exceeded 30 thousand people. By the end of the year, the Novakid teaching staff grew to 1000 people, highly qualified platform teachers who teach children exclusively in English conducted more than a million online lessons in January 2021.

A sharp jump is also observed in the total turnover of the company. If at the end of 2019 it amounted to about $2 million, USA then in 2020 the amount exceeded $9 million.

2020 was a record year for our company in a number of indicators, primarily in terms of the growth rate of students. We associate this not only with the restrictions on the coronavirus introduced around the world, including the complete closure of schools, but also with the growing confidence in online education in general. I believe that in the future we expect a combination of online and offline learning formats. Many preschool institutions, schools and universities, starting to use online learning tools, saw that some of them can really optimize the educational process. Therefore, the mixed format of training will continue to be in demand, it will be actively finalized and developed, - the founder of Novakid Maxim Azarov shared his opinion.

According to experts, the volume of the Russian b2c online education market exceeds 45 billion rubles with an average annual growth rate of 20%. At the end of 2023, its value may exceed 60 billion rubles a year with an average annual growth rate of 12-15%. The total volume of the online learning market in Russia includes segments of additional education for adults and children of school and preschool age, commercial online support technologies and content for the educational process in secondary general and higher education programs.

By 2023, the global online education market promises to take the bar of $282.62 billion. According to Global Market Insights, in 2017 it was measured at $159 billion, in 2018 - $190 billion, in 2019 - $205 billion. According to experts, the average annual growth rate of the market in the next 5-7 years will be 7-10%.

In 2020, Novakid significantly expanded the functionality of its students' personal offices, as well as updated educational courses: quizzes, quizzes and other elements of competitions with their award and incentive systems were introduced. Using this format, the online school follows the global trends in the gamification of education.

The Novakid platform also uses digital solutions that contribute to the individualization of services and personal selection of teachers and tasks for students. Among the tools used: a methodology for assessing the progress of students, using more than 900 parameters as of January 2021, the use of A/B testing methods and other components of the approach related to big data analysis, the use of machine learning methods to recognize visual and speech data. All this allows you to get clear indicators of training performance at any time and flexibly adjust the program for each student. In addition, the Novakid platform uses a model of mass online role-playing games (MMORPG).

In 2021, Novakid will continue to actively develop several areas that are already actively used in the platform's work in January 2021: video and voice recognition and analysis, analysis of student behavior scenarios, construction of recommendation models, personalization of training and automation of teachers.

History

2021

Rebranding for $100,000

In the fall of 2021, EdTech-company Novakid for the first time held a brand update. The project, investments in which amounted to $100 thousand, was implemented jointly with the agency Proximity/BBDO. Internal movements are at the root of external changes: multiple growth of the company and entry into new regional markets, Novakid said on November 22, 2021.

Optimization of IT infrastructure ensured stable growth of Novakid in the international market: only from the beginning of 2021, the growth in the number of users of the online platform reached the level of 700%. 5 years after its founding, Novakid operates in 45 countries - in Europe, the Middle East and the Asia-Pacific region. The company's total customer base reached half a million users.

As a result of expansion into foreign markets, strategic changes and launches of new projects for greater personification and gamification of the educational product, there was a need to update the Novakid visual and semantic code for the first time.

The purpose of updating the Novakid brand is to improve the quality of communication with users through a simple and most accurate system of visual and ideological "markers" that are understandable in all countries of presence. To achieve the goal, the company's logo was simplified, a branded color palette and headset appeared.

"The strategic goal of new visual and ideological constants is to make" English for children "and Novakid synonyms. Investments in the brand renewal project correspond to this goal: we expect that they will pay off with a multiple increase in recognition in the global market and an increase in user loyalty, "said Novakid CEO Maxim Azarov.

Raising $35 million in investments

In early August 2021, Novakid announced the attraction of $35 million in investments. Invested in the online English language learning platform are the EdTech market-focused Owl Ventures fund, previously invested in educational services MasterClass and Quizlet, and Goodwater Capital, an investor in Twitter and Spotify. Current shareholders also participated in the round, including Leta Capital, PortfoLion, TMT Investments, etc.

According to Novakid's own data, the platform serves 380,000 customers by early August 2021. The number of students in the first half of 2021 increased by 700%. The project is presented in 43 countries, including Russia, 80% of customers live in Europe.

Novakid online English school founded by Russians raised $35 million in investment

Due to investments, Novakid plans to enter new markets in Asian countries and strengthen its position in existing ones - in Europe, the Middle East and North Africa. Also, the company promises to strengthen the development of educational content, improve gamification technologies, expand cooperation with linguistic laboratories in Europe and the United States to make training as personalized as possible.

Partner Skyeng Alexander Laryanovsky is convinced that it is logical for the creators of Novakid to focus their attention on the Asian market, since the Russian one is already very crowded with a variety of platforms and there is tougher competition. In his opinion, new EdTech projects in this segment will continue to appear in the Russian Federation.

Teaching English is not the market in which you can build a company with an estimate of $1 billion, working only in Russia, agrees Dmitry Kalaev, partner of IIDF Invest.

Teaching English is a large and promising market on a global scale, there is still a lot of room for investment, the founder of Netology-Groups Maxim Spiridonov is sure.^[1]

2020

Attracting investment from LETA Capital and TMT Investments

Novakid logo in 2020.

As it became known in early December 2020, LETA Capital and TMT Investments invested in Novakid. According to the results of the entire A Series round, the Russian online English school raised $4.25 million.

TMT Investments invested $500,000 The expenses of other investors were not disclosed. At the same time, it is known that the Hungarian PortfoLion fund, part of the OTP Group, invested the most in the startup. Novakid intends to spend the funds received to maintain business growth and develop innovations in the project.

LETA Capital and TMT Investments Invest in Russian Online English School Novakid

The platform attracted the attention of investors, thanks to the dynamics of development. Over the year, the company's customer base and revenue increased by more than 500%. Operationally, the company is characterized by a consistently high level of customer retention, developed sales on the international market and reliable monetization through paid subscriptions, "said Novakid founder Maxim Azarov, commenting on attracting investments.

According to Artyom Inyutin, co-founder and managing partner of the TMT Investments venture capital fund, a boom is expected in the Edtech market in the coming year, and the cost of teaching English will grow at a high pace around the world. The Novakid team has created a "wonderful product" that conquers the market, he noted.

LETA Capital Managing Partner Alexander Chachava noted that Novakid is showing "incredible" growth in difficult times, operating in more than 30 countries around the world and significantly expanding its presence in the market.

We believe that Novakid stands out due to its special attention to taking into account the features of child psychology, the use of an advanced technical platform and a good methodological study of unique game lessons that are both exciting and effective, he said.[2]

$1.5 million investment from LETA Capital and BonAngels

On January 29, 2020, it became known that venture the fund LETA Capital announced an investment round together South Korean with the BonAngels venture fund to Novakid, a developer and provider of online training services operating in the countries and. Europe Asia The volume of this round amounted to $1.5 million, and this is the second stage of the external for financings Novakid: since its inception, the company has raised $2.2 million. The investments will be aimed at further improving the technology platform and expanding the geography of the company's presence. At the same time, at the end of January 2020, Novakid's turnover is $2 million, and the company's business grew more than three times in 2019. The same dynamics is planned to be maintained in 2020.

Novakid, founded by Russian entrepreneur Maxim Azarov in 2017, is an online English school for children aged 4-12, where all teachers are native speakers and have teaching certificates for working with children. The training is based on a platform developed by Novakid, which, using virtual reality and gamification technologies, provides a deep immersion of children in the process of mastering the language. At the same time, a model of mass online role-playing games (MMORPG) is used, thanks to which students, when mastering the material, can interact with each other and earn personal "achievements," and teachers act as participants and moderators of this process. At the same time, based on machine learning, the methodology for assessing the progress of students (it uses more than 900 parameters, A/I testing and other components of the data-driven approach) allows you to obtain clear indicators of learning performance at any time and flexibly adjust the program for each student.

As of January 29, 2020, Novakid provides services to students from 36 countries, including Russia, Poland, Spain, Germany and Turkey. Note that one of the key principles of Novakid's teaching work is a clear adherence to the cultural characteristics of different regions. By inviting teachers representing various ethnocultural traditions, Novakid creates more comfortable learning conditions for the students themselves, and for their parents - confidence in the observance of ethical standards by school teachers.

For us, this is not the first investment in a rapidly developing and promising market for educational technologies. - Modern approaches, such as the virtualization of the educational process, the use of machine learning elements to create and fine-tune curricula for the individual features of each student, gamification, are already in demand on a global scale. But the prospects of companies working in this area will be determined not only by the technological capabilities of educational platforms, but also by the depth of understanding of the humanitarian, human component of the interaction between teacher and student. Novakid technologies and techniques take into account both of these components, which in my opinion determines the rapid growth of the company in the international market, says Alexander Chachava, Managing Partner of LETA Capital Fund

The general passion for studying foreign languages ​ ​ on the Internet is a long-term and steady trend. However, many commonly used tools, such as conducting lessons via Skype or other similar services, are essentially just an attempt to transfer traditional "lessons" to remote mode. In order to achieve truly breakthrough results, you need to use all the possibilities of modern technologies. It is for this that we have developed our own training methodology, created an online platform for it and built an appropriate process for selecting, training and evaluating teachers. This made it possible to maximize the interest and motivation of children, immerse them in educational activities, and, ultimately, to ensure a stable high level of their mastery of a foreign language - in each of the countries where our company operates, says Maxim Azarov, co-founder and CEO of Novakid