Zenius Education Startup Receives Pre-Series B Investments

Educational startup Zenius announced an undisclosed amount of its Pre-Series B funding round. At this stage, new investors Alpha JWC Ventures and Openspace Ventures joined forces with Northstar, Kinesys, and BeeNext, which supported Zenius through Series A funding in February 2020.

Zenius plans to use these funds to further develop its platform to meet the growing market demand. “We are working around the clock to develop new features that will help students get the best learning outcomes through technology,” said CEO Zenius Rohan Monga, quoted from a press release, Tuesday (5/1).

Recently Zenius launched the Automated Doubt-Solving feature through our application and WhatsApp. This feature will provide a solution to students using only the camera on their cell phone. The system will then recommend a video and practice questions to explain the process behind the solution and allow students to actively apply it in a series of practice questions.

Openspace Ventures Director Ian Sikora said Zenius’s services were in demand over the past year. Therefore, companies are interested in investing in this startup. “Zenius is one of the most promising edtech companies we’ve seen,” said Ian. “We hope that this new funding round will encourage Zenius’ growth even further.”

Partner and Investment at Alpha JWC Ventures Eko Kurniadi also added, Zenius has had a positive impact on the learning process in Indonesia. “Not only does it get students accepted into dream universities, but also teaches students real thinking skills,” he said.

Edtech Startup Services are in Great Demand amid the Pandemic

Online learning services like Zenius are in demand during the corona pandemic. This prompted the company’s revenue to grow 70% on an annual basis (year on year / yoy) more during the second half of 2020.

The number of users also grew more than 10 times from March to December 2020. User retention also reached more than 90%. Zenius said, almost 50% of its revenue comes from the live class segment.

Meanwhile, the presence of users in each class averages 400 students. In 2020, Zenius will make most of the content on the platform free. The startup also adopted a freemium business model after updating its application and re-branding in June last year.

Collaborating with Telkomsel to Hold Competitions for Students All Over Indonesia

Zenius also collaborated with cellular operators such as Telkomsel to create the Ilmupedia program that offers students a 30 GB learning quota. There is also the Zenius Telkomsel Scholarship Test, which guides more than 15 thousand high school students from Banda Aceh to Timika.

The two companies held a quiz competition entitled “Ilmupedia Dare to Answer” for high school students in Indonesia. This competition will be held online, given the pandemic that has not ended in Indonesia.

Interested students can register themselves directly via the following link https://ilmupedia.co.id/ibj or via the Zenius application. Registration opens from 8 December 2020 to 10 January 2021.

This competition involves more than 3,500 schools in Indonesia with a total prize pool of more than IDR 400 million and the winner will be announced in March 2021. “This collaboration aims to increase student motivation and introduce a technology-based education system in Indonesia,” said Adhi Putranto, President of Telkomsel Prepaid Consumer.

“Telkomsel is very pleased with the collaboration with Zenius, which has been well received so far and has provided tangible results that can bring technology benefits to many students in Indonesia,” said Adhi in an official statement.

The startup also launched a free Learning Management System for teachers. With this program, Zenius has established a strategic partnership with the local government and the application is used by more than 6,000 teachers in Indonesia.