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Tencent Backs Nigerian Edtech Startup, uLesson, In $15m Series B Round

December 10, 2021

uLesson, a two-year-old Nigerian edtech startup, has raised $15 million in a Series B financing. Tencent, Nielsen Ventures, and current investors Owl Ventures, TLcom Capital, and Founder Collective closed the transaction, which comes 11 months after uLesson received a $7.5 million Series A. It is the largest publicly announced investment in an African educational technology company.

“Tencent historically has been a prolific investor in edtech. They have a lot of learnings and that’s evident when you talk to them and the investments they’ve made not only in China but in India and across the world,” said founder and CEO, Sim Shagaya. “In them, we saw the partner that was willing to kind of get in here, work with us, and then give us the fuel to double down on what works.”

According to the company, the fresh funding would allow uLesson to continue investing in product development, expand its core technology, and introduce cohort-based learning features.

It also intends to add “social sciences and financial accounting to the secondary level content library, as well as qualitative and quantitative reasoning to the elementary level” to its science and mathematics material.

Why The Investors Invested

uLesson has acquired considerable traction since it was founded in 2019. The number of paying users on uLesson increased by 600% in the last year, according to the company. Its monthly average users climbed by 700 percent, while daily average users increased by 430 percent in the same time period.
Since its launch in September, the company claims that demand for live lessons has increased by 222 percent. In terms of student achievement, the Abuja-based business says that some students have advanced from the 50th to the 90th percentile in their classes. It also said the uLesson app has received 2 million downloads so far. Over 12.3 million films have been viewed on the platform, and 25.6 million questions have been answered.

David Frankel, managing partner at Founder Collective, compared what uLesson is doing with education in Africa to how Uber transformed transportation and Coupang changed e-commerce in the United States and South Korea, respectively, in a statement.

“I am an enthusiastic supporter of Shagaya and his vision for more accessible and cheap educational options for millions of people,” he said.

A Look At What The Startup Does

Founded in 2019 by Nigerian serial entrepreneur Sim Shagaya, uLesson entered the market just as the epidemic hit last year. As a newly formed company, it has had to swap business concepts a few times to determine what works in an extremely competitive African industry.

The company began by offering K-12 pupils a product pack of SD cards and dongles with pre-recorded videos. They have the option of streaming classes or downloading and storing content on SD cards.

uLesson, on the other hand, has added additional features to make an all-encompassing edtech play for this audience. Quizzes and a homework help function were added to connect students with university instructors. DevKids, a coding class outside of the core uLesson platform, now has a one-to-many live class feature with polls and leaderboards, as well as a one-to-one live experience.

However, DevKids has subsequently been rolled back. According to Shagaya, uLesson is working to integrate the functionality, which began as an experiment in teaching youngsters how to code and eventually accounted for 30% of the company’s revenue, into the uLesson platform by January of next year.

“What we want ultimately is different strata of free users that can use the app and can pay for a premium experience to attend live classes or get the homework helper,” said the CEO, who also founded e-commerce platforms DealDey and Konga.

“And because parents do want to invest in the best for their kids, one of the ways you can do that is personalized one-to-one instruction for their children, whether in coding through DevKids or math or science or English.”

uLesson employs 180 field sales representatives to onboard schools and individual users in Nigeria, Uganda, Kenya, and Ghana, the countries where the company focuses its marketing efforts.

The platform is also available in other markets, including South Africa, Sierra Leone, the United Kingdom, Liberia, Gambia, and the United States, according to Shagaya. According to Shagaya, Nigeria is uLesson’s largest market by far. 85 percent of uLesson’s paying users are from this country.

“We’re going to be rolling out a lot of these things next year because we’ve seen that this is [how] people use them,” Shagaya remarked, adding that “2021 for us was a year of testing what works and we know what works now. So there’s a lot of experimentation in 2021. And 2022, it will be executing on what works.”

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Charles Rapulu Udoh

Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based lawyer who has advised startups across Africa on issues such as startup funding (Venture Capital, Debt financing, private equity, angel investing etc), taxation, strategies, etc. He also has special focus on the protection of business or brands’ intellectual property rights ( such as trademark, patent or design) across Africa and other foreign jurisdictions.
He is well versed on issues of ESG (sustainability), media and entertainment law, corporate finance and governance.
He is also an award-winning writer

Less Than Two Years After Its Seed Funding, Nigerian Edtech Startup, uLesson, Secures $7.5m In Series A Round

January 19, 2021

A year and a few months after its $3.1m seed round, Nigerian startup uLesson, founded by serial entrepreneur and founder of Konga Sim Shagaya has raised a $7.5 million Series A round led by the US-based Owl Ventures. uLesson is integrating mobile platforms, SD cards, culture-specific curriculum and a network of tutors to bridge educational gaps for secondary school students in Nigeria and broader Africa.

*Ian Chiu, managing director at Owl Ventures*

“We are now witnessing an increased availability of data networks in Africa. With more affordable smartphones and the change in attitudes towards online learning accelerated by COVID-19, the foundations are now in place for an education revolution.

At uLesson, we know we have a critical role to play in this ‘new normal’ and this funding will be crucial in our drive to fill the major gaps in Africa’s education system through tech,” said uLesson founder and ex-Konga chief executive, Sim Shagaya.

Here Is What You Need To Know

Also participating in this round of funding are TLcom Capital, Founder Collective and LocalGlobe.
With the latest investment, the managing director of Owl Ventures, Tory Patterson, joins the uLesson board, to meet TLcom partners, Omobola Johnson and Ido Sum who joined two years ago.
The latest investment brings the startup’s total funding to $10.6m within a space of less than two years.
With the latest investment, uLesson hopes to further its expansion to Africa’s East and South regions.

Why The Investors Invested

Investment in uLesson by Owl Ventures is not coming as a surprise. The San Francisco-based VC has no other business apart from investing in education startups and businesses supported by technology. Its portfolio includes investments in leading edtech platforms, including India’s leading edtech Byju, as well as in Labster, MasterClass and Quizlet.

Last year September, Owl Ventures announced that it had closed a pair of investment vehicles totaling $585 million. While $415 million investment vehicle would be used to invest in edtech startups’ Series A and beyond, its first-ever opportunity fund — at $170 million — would be deployed to work as a growth-stage bank for existing portfolio companies. The new funds allow Owl Ventures to cut larger checks. Traditionally, the firm cut checks that were between $5 million to $35 million. Now, it can write investments up to $50 million in companies. The opportunity fund will exist to back existing investments throughout their lifetime.

“Owl Ventures is honoured to be partnering with uLesson for their Series A. The company has quickly grown into the premier platform, supporting students in Africa. And we are excited to support their global expansion, as they seek to empower students around the world,” Patterson said of the Series A round.

Investment in uLesson by Owl Ventures has also been made easier by the mass adoption of online education brought about by the coronavirus pandemic.

“Edtech as a sector is really exploding and emerging,” said Ian Chiu, a managing director at Owl Ventures. “It’s not that COVID is the reason for that. It’s more that COVID has accelerated that.”

On its part, investor TLcom Capital has been taking a huge bet on African startups. The VC has previously participated in Twiga Foods’ $23.7 million a Series B round led by US investment bank Goldman Sachs. It also participated in Kobo360’s US$30 million debt and equity Series A funding also led by the American multinational investment bank and financial services company Goldman Sachs. In 2019, the VC led a $3.1 million seed round in uLesson.

Founder Collective, a seed-stage fund formed 11 years ago in Cambridge, Ma., also recently closed its newest fund at $85 million. The VC participated in uLesson’s seed round in 2019.

“From the beginning of Founder Collective, we’ve done two kinds of investing, $1 million to $2 million checks, where we lead and take a board seat, and around $400,000 investments, where we participate,” said Eric Paley, one of the firm’s general partners.

LocalGlobe is a UK-based venture capital firm that focuses on seed and impact investments. The VC is one of the investors in African logistics startup Lori Systems.

Generally, investors in uLesson were attracted by Shagaya’s weight as a previous founder at leading ecommerce startup Konga as well as the size of the Nigerian and African edtech market.

startup uLesson Series A startup uLesson Series A startup uLesson Series A startup uLesson Series A

A Look At What uLesson Does

Founded in 2019 by Shagaya — who also founded Nigerian e-commerce startup Konga and ad venture E-Motion — uLesson is headquartered in Lagos with a production studio in Abuja, Nigeria.
uLesson attempts to place priority on education across West African households vs. structural deficiencies — such as student teacher ratios as high as 1:70 in countries such as Nigeria.
uLesson offers an app-based home education kit for students with an up-front yearly subscription price of around $70 and the option to pay as you go. The startup’s product pack will contain a dongle, SD card, and a set of headphones to connect to Android devices.
Curriculum on the uLesson program will include practice tests and tailored content around math, physics, chemistry, and biology. The venture has already created 5000 animated videos for core subjects, according to Shagaya.
To leverage high android mobile penetration in Africa — and minimize data-streaming costs — uLesson content and performance assessment will come via a combination of streaming and SD cards.
Parents and students can connect online temporarily to update the app and sync curriculum and results, while operating off-line for the bulk of lessons.
Shagaya likened the use of SD cards to the old Netflix model of sending and returning DVD’s by mail, prior to faster and more affordable internet service in the U.S.
The uLesson program will also package a human component. The startup plans to deploy a network of counselors in major distribution areas to instruct on how to use app and follow lesson plans.
uLesson is to be a supplement to secondary school education and a more affordable and effective alternative to private tutors, explained Shagaya.
After taking uLesson to market in Africa’s most populous nation — Nigeria — and other countries in the region: Ghana, Sierra Leone, Liberia and the Gambia; Shagaya and team is now intensifing efforts to adapt the product to East and Southern Africa.

Charles Rapulu Udoh

Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based lawyer who has advised startups across Africa on issues such as startup funding (Venture Capital, Debt financing, private equity, angel investing etc), taxation, strategies, etc. He also has special focus on the protection of business or brands’ intellectual property rights ( such as trademark, patent or design) across Africa and other foreign jurisdictions.
He is well versed on issues of ESG (sustainability), media and entertainment law, corporate finance and governance.
He is also an award-winning writer

Nigerian Edtech Startup uLesson Secures Additional Funding On Its $3.1m Seed Round

April 22, 2020

Apparently worried that it might have been missing out on the big opportunity a Nigerian-based education technology startup uLesson is bringing to the table, US-based Venture Capital firm Founder Collective has joined uLesson’s seed round closed in 2019.

“The entire team is excited and humbled by this investment by Founder Collective and the strategic guidance and support they bring to our journey. Building a learning platform like uLesson with a library that is rich in content and scope portends huge benefits for the education system in terms of quality and relevance of content, cost-efficiency, and ease of learning,” Sim Shagaya, Founder and CEO of uLesson, said in a statement.

Here Is All You Need To Know

Although, the amount of investment remains undisclosed, VC Founder Collective is usually known for participating in investments seven-figure and above.
uLesson said the investment would allow it to expand its online learning platform to reach more learners, academic tutors, media and technology to maximize its potential as an edtech player.
In 2019, uLesson raised $3.1mn Seed Round led by TLcom Capital with participation by Sim Shagaya ahead of its market launch in Nigeria in February 2020.
uLesson could count having Shagaya as CEO as one of its advantages in the edtech space. His best known venture, Konga, went head to head with online retailer Jumia in pioneering e-commerce for Nigeria and Africa. Konga was sold in a distressed acquisition in 2018.
In both Nigeria and Kenya uLesson will face competition from existing ventures. Edtech in Africa doesn’t have as many companies (or as much VC funding) as leading startup sectors fintech and e-commerce, but there are a number of players.

Why The Investor Invested

Founded in 2009, Founder Collective is a Massachusetts-based seed-stage venture capital fund that helps entrepreneurs build their businesses.

“We only invest at the seed stage and don’t (do) follow-on which means when it comes time to raise the next round we are fully-aligned with the founding team. We provided the initial capital that enabled Dia&Co to expand beyond their first Bushwick warehouse — then sales exploded.

When it came time to raise more money, We could provide Nadia and Lydia with objective advice and act as a sounding board,” the VC noted on its website.

In 2014, the VC participated in Andela’s seed funding round of undisclosed amount, alongside other investors such as Steve Case, Omidyar Network, Founder Collective, Rothenberg Ventures, Learn Capital, Melo7 Tech Partners, and Chris Hughes.

A Look At What Startup uLesson Does

Founded in 2019 by Shagaya — who also founded Nigerian e-commerce startup Konga and ad venture E-Motion — uLesson is headquartered in Lagos with a production studio in Jos.
uLesson attempts to place priority on education across West African households vs. structural deficiencies — such as student teacher ratios as high as 1:70 in countries such as Nigeria.
uLesson offers an app-based home education kit for students with an up-front yearly subscription price of around $70 and the option to pay as you go. The startup’s product pack will contain a dongle, SD card, and a set of headphones to connect to Android devices.
Curriculum on the uLesson program will include practice tests and tailored content around math, physics, chemistry, and biology. The venture has already created 3000 animated videos for core subjects, according to Shagaya.
To leverage high android mobile penetration in Africa — and minimize data-streaming costs — uLesson content and performance assessment will come via a combination of streaming and SD cards.
Parents and students can connect online temporarily to update the app and sync curriculum and results, while operating off-line for the bulk of lessons.
Shagaya likened the use of SD cards to the old Netflix model of sending and returning DVD’s by mail, prior to faster and more affordable internet service in the U.S.
The uLesson program will also package a human component. The startup plans to deploy a network of counselors in major distribution areas to instruct on how to use app and follow lesson plans.
uLesson is to be a supplement to secondary school education and a more affordable and effective alternative to private tutors, explained Shagaya.
After taking uLesson to market in Africa’s most populous nation — Nigeria — and other countries in the region, Shagaya and team plan to adapt the product for a future East Africa launch.

Charles Rapulu Udoh

Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based lawyer who has advised startups across Africa on issues such as startup funding (Venture Capital, Debt financing, private equity, angel investing etc), taxation, strategies, etc. He also has special focus on the protection of business or brands’ intellectual property rights ( such as trademark, patent or design) across Africa and other foreign jurisdictions.
He is well versed on issues of ESG (sustainability), media and entertainment law, corporate finance and governance.
He is also an award-winning writer

Three Reasons Why TLcom Capital Invested In Nigerian Startup uLesson

November 30, 2019

Barely a few months into its founding, Nigerian startup uLesson, founded by serial entrepreneur and founder of Konga Sim Shagaya has raised a $3.1 million seed round led by TLcom Capital. uLesson is integrating mobile platforms, SD cards, culture-specific curriculum and a network of tutors to bridge educational gaps for secondary school students in Nigeria and broader Africa.

‘‘We have this massive gap…We’re adding more babies in this country nominally than all of Western Europe…Even if the [Nigerian] government was super efficient, it couldn’t catch up with the educational needs of the young people that are coming up,” Shagaya said.

This round of financing which was led by TLcom Capital also saw, as part of TLcom’s lead on the investment, partners Omobola Johnson and Ido Sum joining uLesson’s board. uLesson which has been in development phase, also plans to go to market in February 2020 in Nigeria, Ghana, Sierra Leone, and Gambia.

On why the new investments by TLcom were made, partner Ido Sum disclosed in an interview that TLcom was guided by three key questions:

“Is this a good market?”
“Is this the right company?” and;
“Is this a good investment.”

“TLcom’s general investment thesis for Africa is that given the high penetration of mobile, there are very large markets where demand is already proven and technology can play a true role in offering a superior value proposition over existing solutions,” Sum said.

“While education ranks high on both criteria, we struggled to find compelling solutions and teams that combine an ambitious vision, a deep understanding of the pain points and what people are willing to pay for, and a proven execution capacity.”

In uLesson, Sum said TLcom had found a company that ticks all the boxes.

“Having known Sim for years, and his commitment to win when he picks a challenge, it was clear that in uLesson he found a true passion,” said Sum.

“The team spent a year refining “go to market” strategies to beat African challenges such as high cost of data, streaming instability, and issues with monthly payments. In parallel, they started building a world class content library, based out of Jos, Nigeria’s historical media capital, with lots of high quality talent.”

Despite being at a very early stage, uLesson has already thought through many fundamental questions, from a distinct content distribution strategy, to how to attract early users by building trust but also securing the collection of payments from day one.

“Of course we face early-stage risks, but we are excited to partner with the uLesson team with open minds and open eyes, ready to tackle and overcome the challenges ahead,” Sum said.

Charles Rapulu Udoh

Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based Lawyer with special focus on Business Law, Intellectual Property Rights, Entertainment and Technology Law. He is also an award-winning writer. Working for notable organizations so far has exposed him to some of industry best practices in business, finance strategies, law, dispute resolution, and data analytics both in Nigeria and across the world

Nigerian edtech Startup uLesson Raises $3.1 mn In Seed Funding

November 27, 2019

Barely a few months into its founding, Nigerian startup uLesson, founded by serial entrepreneur and founder of Konga Sim Shagaya has raised a $3.1 million seed round led by TLcom Capital. uLesson is integrating mobile platforms, SD cards, culture-specific curriculum and a network of tutors to bridge educational gaps for secondary school students in Nigeria and broader Africa.

‘‘We have this massive gap…We’re adding more babies in this country nominally than all of Western Europe…Even if the [Nigerian] government was super efficient, it couldn’t catch up with the educational needs of the young people that are coming up,” Shagaya said.

Here Is The Deal

This round of financing was led by TLcom Capital. As part of TLcom’s lead on the investment, partners Omobola Johnson and Ido Sum will join uLesson’s board.
According to Sim Shagaya, uLesson carries greater meaning than his previous startups.
uLesson has been in development phase and plans to go to market in February 2020 in Nigeria, Ghana, Sierra Leone, and Gambia — Shagaya told TechCrunch on a call.

“We’re targeting Anglophone West Africa…for a market of effectively 300 million people,” he said.

uLesson could count having Shagaya as CEO as one of its advantages in the edtech space. The venture marks the founder’s return to the startup scene after a hiatus. Shagaya earned a Harvard MBA and worked for Google before repatriating to Nigeria to found several digital companies.
His best known venture, Konga, went head to head with online retailer Jumia in pioneering e-commerce for Nigeria and Africa. Konga was sold in a distressed acquisition in 2018.
In both Nigeria and Kenya uLesson will face competition from existing ventures. Edtech in Africa doesn’t have as many companies (or as much VC funding) as leading startup sectors fintech and e-commerce, but there are a number of players.
Nigeria has online edu startups, such as Tuteria. Feature phone based student learning company Eneza Education has scaled in Kenya and expanded to Ghana.
Shagaya successfully exited his digital advertising venture E-Motion this year, after it was purchased by Loatsad Promedia.

“If you drill down to it all, all our problems in Africa are tied this problem of education…If we do this right, our impact will be huge. For me this is probably the most important work I’ll do,” Shagaya said.

Source: Briter Bridges

Why The Investors Invested

Lead investor TLcom Capital has been taking a huge bet on African startups. The VC has previously participated in Twigga Foods’ $23.7 million a Series B round led by US investment bank Goldman Sachs.

It also participated in Kobo360’s US$30 million debt and equity Series A funding also led by the American multinational investment bank and financial services company Goldman Sachs. From afar, it would appear that it always compliments Goldman Sachs.

Since its founding in 1999, TLcom Capital LLP has invested and exited leading-edge companies in the technology, media and telecom (TMT) sector targeting businesses that address core customer or technology issues in either large established global markets, or in the development of emerging markets with the potential for global scale in the broad TMT domain.

A Look At What uLesson Does

Founded in 2019 by Shagaya — who also founded Nigerian e-commerce startup Konga and ad venture E-Motion — uLesson is headquartered in Lagos with a production studio in Jos.
uLesson attempts to place priority on education across West African households vs. structural deficiencies — such as student teacher ratios as high as 1:70 in countries such as Nigeria.
uLesson offers an app-based home education kit for students with an up-front yearly subscription price of around $70 and the option to pay as you go. The startup’s product pack will contain a dongle, SD card, and a set of headphones to connect to Android devices.
Curriculum on the uLesson program will include practice tests and tailored content around math, physics, chemistry, and biology. The venture has already created 3000 animated videos for core subjects, according to Shagaya.
To leverage high android mobile penetration in Africa — and minimize data-streaming costs — uLesson content and performance assessment will come via a combination of streaming and SD cards.
Parents and students can connect online temporarily to update the app and sync curriculum and results, while operating off-line for the bulk of lessons.
Shagaya likened the use of SD cards to the old Netflix model of sending and returning DVD’s by mail, prior to faster and more affordable internet service in the U.S.
The uLesson program will also package a human component. The startup plans to deploy a network of counselors in major distribution areas to instruct on how to use app and follow lesson plans.
uLesson is to be a supplement to secondary school education and a more affordable and effective alternative to private tutors, explained Shagaya.
After taking uLesson to market in Africa’s most populous nation — Nigeria — and other countries in the region, Shagaya and team plan to adapt the product for a future East Africa launch.

Charles Rapulu Udoh

Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based Lawyer with special focus on Business Law, Intellectual Property Rights, Entertainment and Technology Law. He is also an award-winning writer. Working for notable organizations so far has exposed him to some of industry best practices in business, finance strategies, law, dispute resolution, and data analytics both in Nigeria and across the world