Kenyan ed-tech startup Kidato has raised a seed round of US$1.4 million which will be used to finance the company’s growth and further product development.
Founded last year, Kidato is an online school for K-12 students that provides a high-quality, affordable education to the growing middle class in Africa, where parents must often choose between either public schools with student-teacher ratios as high as 50:1 or private schools with expensive tuition fees.
Kidato classes have student-teacher ratios of 5:1 and teach the same rigorous international curriculum as other private schools — but at a fraction of the price.
The startup – which recently took part in the Silicon Valley-based accelerator Y Combinator and banked US$125,000 in funding – has now concluded an additional US$1.4 million seed funding round, which includes investors such as Learn Start Capital, Launch Africa Ventures, Graph Ventures and Century Oak Capital, as well as an Ivy League university endowment fund and notable local and global angel investors.
“We are also very honoured to have some of our students’ parents join as investors as well. Their faith and belief in our mission is truly humbling,” said Kidato founder Sam Gichuru.
The funding will be ploughed into growth and product development. Kidato currently has more than 700 registered students from eight countries around the world.
“We are looking to work with the best tutors and academias to help shape the future of education in Africa,” Gichuru said.
“The demand for online education has grown from the convergence of a fast growing middle class and high internet penetration with enabling infrastructure services such as Zoom that has seen easier adoption of remote work. Additionally, cutting out commute time in highly congested cities is a welcome relief for parents as it means being able to spend more time with their children.”
