Smartivity, an ed-tech startup which makes use of augmented reality to provide activity based learning solutions, has received $1 million in pre-Series A round, led by S Chand and AdvantEdge Partners.
The current round also saw participation from Singapore-based fund CFG Offshore Holdings, Silicon Valley-based fund Tandem Capital and a group of other angel investors, in what continues to be a capital flushing year for ed tech companies so far.
Founded in January 2015 by Ashwini Singh, Smartivity provides do-it-yourself science, art and craft kits for children designed to enhance practical, creative and analytical intelligence. This fresh capital boost will be used by the company to expand its current portfolio in STEM and augmented reality products to provide interactive learning to kids. It will also deploy a significant amount to develop IoT-enabled toys and robot-led learning for kids.
The company develops physical, augmented reality-enabled and internet-connected activities based S.T.E.M (science, technology, engineering and Math education) learning toys for 3-12 year old children. The projects are aimed at wholesome development of different skill sets in youngsters.
Smartivity Activity Boxes are ‘Do-It-Yourself’ kits that are designed to help children understand fundamental scientific and real world concepts, and their application in real life, through play. The instruction book explains the scientific concepts that are applied through the project and an activity sheet suggests further activities that a child can explore through the project with their parents.
The activities are collaborative arts, craft and science based projects designed around the Theory of Successful Intelligence proposed by Robert Sternberg, a world famous psychologist, claims company. It further says that these activities are designed to prepare child for real world challenges by playfully developing creative, analytical and practical skills.
Earlier, the company had raised around $200,000 in its seed funding round from S Chand and Co. Pvt. Ltd., which also participated in the current funding round. The funding was raised to strengthen its supply chain and expand its presence in new cities across the nation.
It must be noted here, that while there are many ed tech startup raising significant amount of fundingfor all sorts of online tutorials and lectures, there are very few of them are making use of such cutting-edge technology for offering some really disruptive education products and services.
In this space, Smartivity will be competing against the likes of Jay Robotix and Avishkaar Box. Jay Robotix had raised $250K from CBA and Thakral Group, while Avishkaar Box has developed interactive robots for children to encourage them to learn programming.
