Finnish startup Kide Science raises €1.5m in seed round to accelerate international growth

Finnish startup Kide Science raises €1.5m in seed round to accelerate international growth

Published: 28-05-2020 16:14:00 | By: Pie Kamau | hits: 4427 | Tags:

Global early childhood science learning provider startup Kide Science has secured €1.5m funding in a seed round led by Sparkmind.vc, with selected existing investors including Zanichelli Venture also participating. Kide Science has now raised a total of €2.4m since launching at the end of 2017. This investment is the third from Sparkmind.vc’s €40m learning-focused venture capital fund.

The investment is focused on accelerating Kide Science’s international growth. It will enable the business to pursue new opportunities in Asia and across key international homeschooling markets. The investment will also allow rapid expansion of the company’s existing parent product as well as funding key hires in global business development and marketing.

Sari Hurme-Mehtälä, Kide Science’s CEO commented: ''We’re excited that this new investment allows us to rapidly scale our global sales and marketing activities. This will help us teach key science skills to even more children globally, enabling them to better understand their world. Being purely learning sector focused Sparkmind.vc is an ideal partner for us and we look forward to working with them.''

Kide Science has created a playful STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Maths) pedagogical model, following rigorous research by one of the company’s Founders at the University of Helsinki. Their approach puts young learners into imaginary science scenarios, empowering them to solve real problems through story-telling and play-based activities. Teachers and parents can easily deliver these in formal/informal learning settings, including at home, to support children’s curiosity and scientific thinking.

Kai Talas of Sparkmind.vc said: ''We see early childhood education as a highly attractive market segment with significant growth prospects and lucrative opportunities for scalable solution providers like Kide Science. For Sparkmind, Kide Science stands out because of its very strong pedagogical proposition and outstanding multidisciplinary team. We’re excited to lead this seed round and to build on the significant momentum the company has already generated.''

Kide Science’s research-led pedagogy has helped them to win customers in 14 global markets. In Finland, the business has a rapidly growing customer base, including the City of Helsinki and nation’s largest private kindergarten chain (200 locations and 10,000 children). It also produces a TV show on YLE, Finland’s national public service broadcaster. In addition, Kide Science has signed deals in MENA, the Far East and with a large chain of learning centres in China. The latter will see the company’s programmes delivered in 70 locations across 30 provinces.

kidescience.com

www.sparkmind.vc