Riiid Inc, a leading South Korean AI education company, recently announced that it has raised $175 million in its Series E funding round from SoftBank Group Corp’s Vision Fund 2.
It is Riiid’s largest funding round to date, and it brings the company’s total funding to $250 million, according to a press statement.
“Riiid wants to transform education with AI, and achieve a true democratization of educational opportunities,” said Riiid CEO YJ Jang. “This investment is only the beginning of our journey in creating a new industry ecosystem and we will carry out this mission with global partnerships,” he added.
The company plans to use the new funding to further strengthen its AI technology and extend its global technology lead in AI for education. Riiid is establishing R&D centers and data labeling centers in the US, Canada, and Ghana to attract global talent and to build out its technical infrastructure.
Founded in 2014, Riiid has replaced all workbooks and teachers with AI tutor. Through its AI technology, the Seoul-based company provides each student with a one-on-one tutor, which far outpaces human tutors at a fraction of the cost. The company has even published the results of its research on its one-on-one AI tutoring technology in an academic journal. Riiid was also the first Korean company to present a research paper on AI technology at the Conference on Neural Information Processing Systems (NIPS), the world’s top conference on artificial intelligence, in 2016.
Over the past year, Riiid Labs, the global arm of Riiid, has expanded the company’s market across the US, South America, Middle East, and Asia with partners such as Kaplan, ConnecME, Grupo INICIE, and Casa Grande, combining Riiid’s AI technology and the content provided by those companies to create personalized learning services.
“Riiiid is driving a paradigm shift in education, from a ‘one-size-fits-all approach to personalized instruction. Powered by AI and machine learning, Riiid’s platform provides education companies, schools, and students with personalized plans and tools to optimize learning potential,” said Greg Moon, Managing Partner at SoftBank Investment Advisers. “We are delighted to partner with YJ and the Riiid team to support their ambition of democratizing quality education around the world.”
Riiid has last raised $41.8 million Series D funding in July 2020 from IMM Investment, Korea Development Bank, and InterVest. Prior to that, it raised $18 million in its Series C funding round from investors including DSC Investments, Apenroute Asset Management, Premiere Partners, IMM Investment, and Korea Growth Investment Corporation.
