Mathpresso, a South Korean edtech startup adds Google as an investor

Mathpresso, the Seoul-based edtech firm behind QANDA, an AI-based learning app for K-12 kids, announced today it has added Google as a new investor.

Google's undisclosed investment is not part of the business's Series C funding raised in June, according to the company, without providing its valuation.

The new investment comes five months after the company's $50 million Series C round, which pushed its total capital to $105 million as of June. SoftBank Venture Asia, MiraeAsset Venture Investment, Smilegate Investment, Samsung Venture Investment Corporation, and Legend Capital have previously invested in the company.

Mathpresso anticipates that the company will benefit from synergies with Google in terms of worldwide market expansion and technological advancement.

Outside of Korea, Japan and Southeast Asia account for more than 85 % of QANDA users. The Seoul-based company has offices in Tokyo, Hanoi, Jakarta, and Bangkok, and it supports seven languages: English, Spanish, Korean, Japanese, Thai, Vietnamese, and Indonesian.

Mathpresso was launched in 2015 by co-CEO Ray Lee and Jake Lee, who created QANDA as a platform for 1:1 Q&A. Mathpresso released QANDA in 2016, which delivers thorough math solutions as well as individualised learning content according to each user's level. QANDA's AI-based optical character recognition (OCR) technology, which was introduced in 2017, reads text and mathematical formulas in photos and allows users to search for answers in seconds.

According to the statement, over 10 million images are uploaded to the QANDA platform every day. The QANDA app has over 45 million registered users and 3 billion education data points, with over 12 million monthly active users in 50 countries, according to the company.

Earlier this year, Mathpresso introduced new features to QANDA, including a premium membership model that provides unlimited "byte-sized" micro-video lectures and a community feature that improves collaborative learning by acting as an online study group.

"Google's investment opens up tremendous potential for Mathpresso and strengthens our ability to assist students all across the world," said Mathpresso's chief financial officer, Soo Nahm. "This investment, along with the recent Series C funding, will enable us accelerate our global market expansion and technological advancement."

QANDA is available on Android, iOS, and web.