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Camp K12, the edtech startup focused on building a global online school for 21st-century skills, has raised $12 million in a Series A round co-led by Matrix Partners India and Elevation Capital. The company has seen growth in two new geographies, one new subject category, and a new group-class format launched over the past six months. 

Funds will be used to hire leaders across functions, hyperscale operations and marketing, and to build a world-class engineering and product team.

Camp K12’s US business has grown 2x month-on-month over the past three months, with 75 percent of enrolments coming at 0 CAC from organic activities. At the same time, Camp K12’s Middle East business has grown 3x month-on-month. In both geographies, Camp K12 offers its in-house 3D coding platform “HatchXR” and a different coding curriculum from its India business to create delight among a consumer segment that has already been exposed to coding basics in schools and craves a different level of cutting-edge tech exposure.

Anshul Bhagi, Co-founder, Camp K12  said, “We have laid the foundations for a global online school, and we’re ready to scale. My view is that an enduring institution in a crowded market of online schools will not be built through sales and marketing excellence alone, but through differentiated acquisition, engagement, and retention of customers.

“I believe in the power of community, and in network effects. We have a bold roadmap for social multiplayer experiences for our kids, in class and outside of class, and we’re excited for our users to start experiencing this product as early as next month,” he adds.

The startup connects students in the five to 18 age group across the globe with inspiring teachers for live, interactive online courses across essential 21st-century skill categories such as coding and English.

Camp K12 launched English as its first category beyond coding, with a two-year learning path for every age group, covering foundational elements such as grammar and vocabulary as well as aspirational outcomes such as Creative Writing and Public Speaking. Every child in the programme writes and publishes a novel on Amazon and Kindle, participates in international debates on current events, gives TED-styled talks to live audiences, competes in Spelling Bees, and more. The English business has grown 2x month on month for the past three months.

Sandeep Bhagi, Co-founder, Camp K12 said, “We are able to establish our product leadership in every category and geography we have forayed into, be it India, Middle East, or the United States. We take pride in building a very loyal, happy and satisfied user base of hundreds of thousands of parents and students who are looking at a quality online education at affordable pricing. This Series A Investment will accelerate our expansion and we are beefing up our team with experienced Do-ers from Business, Sales, Marketing, Product, Operations and Engineering.”

The students learn one-on-one with private teachers, or in small groups with friends, in Camp K12’s gamified online environments. Outside of class, students continue to interact with classmates across Camp K12’s “LinkedIn for Kids” — like community app featuring real-time multiplayer duels, self-paced quizzes, free workshops, and daily brain development.

“Over the last 12 months, Camp K12 has built out on its operational excellence and customer delight function across multiple categories, from specializing in coding for the K-12 category they have now further expanded into English with a differentiated curriculum that empowers every child to publish a novel. We’re excited for the next leg of growth as we co-invest with Elevation Capital in this round,” said Vikram Vaidyanathan, Managing Director, Matrix India

In the next six months, the company will add two new geographies and one new content category, and will deepen its reach in each existing geography via a group class format that in India already accounts for over 25 percent of revenues.

“We are convinced that there is a massive global market for 21st-century skills for kids. We believe that success in this global arena, will require a different go-to-market playbook and product than what we’ve seen in the past. Camp K12, with its social, multiplayer online learning platform, has stood out from Day 1 as an innovator in this space. We have seen Camp K12 successfully using technology to own quality and end-to-end experience, and to evolve a new pedagogy for online learning. Their investment in product R&D has also allowed them to nimbly expand into new categories and geographies and to rapidly scale small group classes as a format. We’re thrilled to double down on our partnership with Camp K12 and are really excited about what lies ahead,” said Mukul Arora, Partner, Elevation Capital.

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