EdTech platform, Yougami (EkSlate) announces the closing of its pre-seed funding round and raises USD 100K with participation from Marwari Catalysts, Mr. Ankur Mishra and Mr. Dalpat Bhansali and other strategic investors from the ecosystem.
Arjeeta C. Singhvi, Founder and CEO with Sudhanshu Vyas, Co-founder and CMO
According to the company statement, the startup plans to utilise the amount for expanding its product offering, maximizing technology integration for enhanced learning, and scaling up business operations. Furthermore, the platform will also look to create high-impact marketing and expand its team across necessary verticals.
Founded by Arjeeta C. Singhvi, Yougami is a Marwari Catalysts’ portfolio company with the vision to bridge the gap between what is required by the new world careers and our children’s skills. While subject knowledge is important, at Yougami the child is enabled to develop higher-order thinking skills of logic, analysis, critical thinking, creativity, innovation, and communication, thus transforming them from being mere ‘knowledge acquirers’ to ‘knowledge multipliers’.
Speaking on the funding, Arjeeta C. Singhvi, Founder & CEO of Yougami, Ex Managing Director of Operations at AIESEC India, Ex Program Consultant at Upgrad, Ex Community Manager at Great Learning says, “At Yougami, we’re on a mission to create a community of skilled, responsible, and 21st-century-ready students and hence follow a learning approach of ‘UpSkilling’ and ‘Not Tutoring’. We will leverage this capital infusion to fortify our technological capabilities, enhance our product offerings, and expand our business operations nationally.”
Arjeeta also added, “We believe the face of the Indian education system is changing and we want to play a vital role in that. We’ve been very privileged to see the confidence of our investors and mentors. We started with an idea and a belief to solve a problem, and we’re glad that our investors and mentors believed in us and our ideas.”
Earlier the choices of students were restricted to maths, English, Science, etc but with the evolution of technology in the education system, it is necessary to have creative and skill-based solutions with innovative learning, where students will have a wider horizon in terms of future opportunities.
Further adding, Sudhanshu Vyas, Co-founder & CMO, Yougami says, “We feel that there’s a huge gap between the quality of the workforce entering the market and market requirements. At Yougami, we’re trying to bridge that gap by delivering the skills of tomorrow to the students. We’re very grateful to all our investors and mentors for supporting us on this journey so far. And as we advance further, we hope to receive more support throughout this journey.”
Being a strategic investor in educational domain from last 20 years, Ankur Mishra, Director – Central Academy Jodhpur Education Society comments on the investment, “India with its 1.2 billion population has an enormous demand for education at its core. Hence with Yougami’s deep understanding of the market, we firmly believe that the startup will be able to unleash the student potential across the nation. Also with strong potential people like Arjeeta on board who hold comprehensive understanding of the ecosystem, I am confident that the founding team will contribute significantly to the EdTech industry.”
Sharing his point of view, Sushil Sharma, Founder & CEO, Marwari Catalysts says, “The Indian education system has a large gap in the early schooling, especially in developing strong foundations for children in scientific thinking, critical and creative thinking and communication skills. We believe Yougami is a very relevant and unique solution that complements the core education to help provide the right platform for lifelong academic excellence.”
To conclude, delivering the skills of tomorrow, Yougami’s focus is to help kids develop skills, which usually does not happen solely through the school curriculum. The founding team of the startup also comments, “We are thrilled to have Marwari Catalysts as a partner in building Yougami. Their experience of working with entrepreneurs to build strong organizations and brands with rapid scale-up is a very apt fit for us at this stage in our growth journey.”
