Buddy.ai funding news – Montenegro-based Buddy.ai Secures €10.2 Million in Seed Funding

Investor of the round

The funding round was led by BITKRAFT Ventures which focuses on gaming and interactive media, and included Educapital, Europe’s largest education tech fund.

Other investors in this round were One Way Ventures, J Ventures, Point72 Ventures, and Goodwater Capital. Notable angel investors also participated, including the co-founder of Oculus and former executives from Riot Games and Hollywood producers of famous shows like The Simpsons.

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Investors from different fields like AI, education, gaming, and entertainment are drawn to Buddy.ai because of its unique app. The app features Buddy, an interactive animated robot that talks with students in real-time, helping kids under 12 learn English.

Aim of the company

It's aims to provide one-on-one AI tutoring to children worldwide. According to UNESCO 69 million more teachers are needed globally to achieve basic education for everyone.

With a significant shortage of teachers, AI tutoring is a fast and affordable solution. While it started with English language learning, it has recently introduced an Early Learning Course and plans to offer more subjects in the future.

Ivan Crewkov, Buddy.ai’s CEO and Co-founder, said, “Buddy.ai was inspired by watching my daughter’s struggles as an immigrant learning a new language in a new country. The Buddy.ai team believes that personalized education is a right and not a privilege, and every child deserves a personal tutor, so when we look towards the future of the platform, we see every child in the world as a potential student.”

To create Buddy's great voice interaction, Buddy.ai started developing its own Speech Recognition technology four years before the rise of AI with ChatGPT.

Most AI systems are designed to recognize adult voices, but Buddy’s Speech Recognition (BSR) is made to understand children’s voices and follows specific rules for child safety. With more than 25,000 hours of children's speech in its database, BSR works better than Google and other standard speech recognition systems.

Jasper Brand, Partner at BITKRAFT Ventures said, “The traditional 1-on-1 teacher-to-child education model is unaffordable for many families and not scalable for teachers. Buddy.ai is uniquely positioned with a threefold combination of technical depth, expertise in Early Learning, and a knack for positively engaging content. Kids have a higher learning efficacy when their personal learning journey is met with dynamically adjusting difficulty levels and amplified when engaged with a fun IP. It gets even better when you can democratize access to great learning experiences for an underserved global population,”

Funding utilisation

With the new funding, the Buddy.ai team plans to lead the way in early learning with AI by improving their technology, enhancing the app's games and world-building features, and partnering with schools and educational institutions.

About Buddy.ai

Buddy.ai offers affordable, high-quality one-on-one teaching for kids around the world through an interactive, voice-based character named Buddy the Robot. Buddy uses special AI technology designed for children and provides a fun user experience. He teaches kids with voice and tap games in an engaging world created by education experts.