Little Thinking Minds, the Jordan-based regional ed-tech company, has announced $1.265m in Series A funding in a round led by Algebra Ventures with participation from Mindshift Capital and Al Turki Group.
Little Thinking Minds is a leading education technology company that creates advanced digital solutions and platforms aimed at improving learning outcomes for school aged children in the MENA region and beyond.
Founders Rama Kayyali and Lamia Tabbaa started their journey in education back in 2004. ‘As two mothers, we grew increasingly frustrated by the lack of engaging Arabic educational products for our children at home and in schools,’ says says Rama Kayyali, Little Thinking Minds co-founder & CEO, ‘We built Little Thinking Minds to fix this.’
At its onset, the company started producing edu-taining content as apps and videos that addressed preschool basics focusing on early literacy and numeracy. In 2016, they were joined by Salwa Katkhuda. Capitalizing on the knowledge and experience gained interacting in the regional educational market, the three partners started developing online Arabic literacy solutions and platforms for schools, teachers, and students.
They re-launched Little Thinking Minds as an education technologies and products provider, with a strong focus on creating comprehensive digital platforms geared towards improving learning outcomes. The transformation was met with huge success, with LTM products for native and non-native Arabic speakers currently being used by over 200 schools and 80,000+ students across the region. The company has offices in Jordan, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia.
LTM has not gone unnoticed by regional investors, ‘The region has a booming student population, and this has put a huge strain on traditional education systems,’ says Karim Hussein, Algebra Ventures Managing Partner, ‘Arabic literacy is increasingly important and has been largely underserved. The one-size-fits-all approach of traditional schooling is leaving many students behind. Little Thinking Minds is filling this gap and supplementing stressed education systems by providing high quality Arabic-language learning resources. LTM’s digital solutions enable self-directed & individualized student learning, and have had a demonstrated impact on improving educational outcomes.’
Speaking about the investment, Kayyali notes, ‘This Series A round, led by Algebra, will support us in expanding our product portfolio as well empowering our product platforms with data tools and analytics that will improve student learning journeys and their outcomes. We wish to capitalize on our strong traction, perfect the user journey in terms of learning outcomes and user experience, and become the educational platform and partner of choice across the region. ’