Amman, Jordan
Edtech startup Abwaab today announces the closing of its $5.1M USD seed round, bringing its total funding to $7.5M USD. Investors who participated in the round include 4DX Ventures, BECO Capital, EQ2 Ventures, Foundation Ventures, GSV Ventures, and Spartech Ventures. With eyes set on new markets, the Jordanian-based edtech startup plans on using this funding to fuel its regional expansion, kicking off with Egypt first which is home to 21M students.
This financing comes almost a year after Abwaab launched its product in Jordan. Since then, the startup has been laser focused on product and content development. It has produced over 50 thousand video lessons and questions and currently serves hundreds of thousands of unique students. To support its plans for scalability, tech development has also been in high gear and numerous features have been built that revolutionize the way students assess their knowledge and track their progress throughout their journey.
With regards to student engagement, Abwaab reports double-digit growth WoW in lessons watched and questions solved on its platform. This is proving to reflect positively in student performance at school. One student, Reem Al-Azazmeh (Grade 9) told the startup that after relying solely on Abwaab last semester, she ended up being the top performer of her class.
“GSV is proud to make Abwaab our first investment in the MENA region. To us, Abwaab represents the opportunity for a deeply talented team of entrepreneurs to dramatically increase access to high-quality education first in Jordan and then in MENA more broadly,” said Deborah Quazzo, Managing Partner at GSV Ventures, one of the early VCs to invest in both Masterclass and Coursera.
“Abwaab is tackling a regional whitespace through a deeply thought-out platform focused on delivering quality educational content to students across the arab world. BECO was captivated by how mission-driven and execution-focused the founding team are, particularly having achieved a lot with very little demonstrating how resourceful and efficient the team is whilst producing extremely high quality work. We are proud to be a part of their journey in establishing themselves as the de-facto market leaders in the space,” said Abdulaziz Shikh Al Sagha, Venture Partner at BECO Capital.
“Our region is home to over 100 million students. To unleash their full potential, we are empowering the upcoming generation with education. There is no region more ripe for education disruption than ours, and the entire Abwaab team has set sail to take this challenge head on,” said Hamdi Tabbaa, Co-founder & CEO, Abwaab.