Zeraki, a Kenyan Edtech platform that leverages digital learning and school data analytics solutions to promote quality education in Africa, has raised $1.8 million in a seed funding round to improve its product catalogue and expand regional services.
The funding round was led by Acumen Fund and other participants included Save the Children Impact Investment Fund, Verdant Frontiers Fintech, Logos Ventures, the Nairobi Business Angels Network (NaiBAN), and Melvyn Lubega, co-founder of Go1, an Australia-based edtech unicorn.
Isaac Nyangolo, CEO and co-founder of Zaraki, spoke about some of the ambitions the startup has with this new investment fund. He said that Zaraki is hoping to add more administrative tools for schools, such as timetabling software, alongside assisting parents with fee loans.
He also said,
We’ve built an extensive distribution channel covering almost half of the high schools in Kenya and that means, we have an opportunity to solve other tech needs that schools have,” said Nyangolo. We plan on building more administrative tools for schools, and payment products on the parents’ side. We have also brought back focus on [the once dormant] digital learning platform, and also tested a number of products like timetabling.
As part of its expansion strategy, Zeraki also aims to scale in its present markets of Kenya, Uganda, and Guinea before expanding into ten other markets over the following three years. It plans to expand into the East African regions first before exploring the Anglophone region.
About Zeraki
It is not surprising that in Africa, due to a lack of infrastructure, the issue of documenting pupils’ performance and report forms are mainly done offline or with a delay. Zeraki was inspired by this void Isaac Nyangolo and Erick Oude saw in the educational environment.
For these two co-founders, Zeraki emerged as the solution to this challenge with its mobile-first cloud-based experience. Zeraki, which was founded in 2014, was first offered as an interactive digital learning platform for high school students, with quizzes and tools to monitor student progress.
The EdTech platform also has a data analytics system, Zeraki analytics. This system aims to revolutionize the way educational data is gathered, examined, and used while also assisting schools in better managing the data related to their pupils.
The data analytics tool delivers a performance breakdown for each student, subject, or stream and enables teachers to upload marks from their mobile devices.
Also, the platform offered a complementary service that integrated a bulk messaging system for internal and external communication, allowing parents a way to keep track of their children’s academic progress and fee payments.
Mission goal of Zeraki
Zeraki’s goal is to make life better for teachers and students as a whole by using these cutting-edge solutions to make quality instruction accessible and relieve the stress associated with routine school administration responsibilities.
The startup wants to revolutionize how educational data is gathered, examined, and utilized in Africa using its flagship tool, Zeraki analytics. especially given that the region has not yet fully digitized education.
Read Also: Here are Technext’s Top 5 Edtech of the Year
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