A software pro with an IIT-M, MS and MBA degrees from the US and a small-time venture capital player himself in a few Silicon Valley start-ups, Ram has got a business idea after seeing kids in the US falling love with smart digital devices.
“I have seen small kids playing and using such devices. I thought why not use them for learning purposes in India,” Ram Gollamudi says, recollecting the early days of his entrepreneurship.
Using digital devices for learning is no big deal. Delivering the right kind of content at a price point that is affordable for them is the key for the success of the model, he points out. That idea soon got translated into Edutor and its Augmented Classroom Solution. “The idea is to give the students a medium they are quite cosy with. We have decided to give them a tool that can lessen the weight of their bags and enhance the scope of learning,” he says.
Ask him how, he would say: “Now you can audit the learning experience of students. You can tell them what they are reading and how long. They can access the content offline as well as online. The moment he comes online, the device would send the administrator the history of content access,” he says.
Ram Gollamudi, who is the founder-CEO, knew well that the task was too big for him to handle it individually. Started off as a one-member firm, Edutor soon had three more people in the promoter group. Prasanna Boni, a technocrat, joined as COO, Sravan Narasipuram as Vice-President Engineering, and Ramesh Karra as Vice-President (Sales and Marketing). All had good experience in the technical, development and marketing fields.
But how difficult was it to raise funds for the project? “We could get commitment from Shashi Reddi, the founder Chief Executive Officer of AppLabs, at the end of the pitch presentation. He believed in the story and agreed to invest,” he says.
Shashi Reddi has just sold his company to CSC for an undisclosed consideration. He had invested Rs 2 crore, while the four promoters brought in Rs 2 crore. About 45 people work for this start-up that is housed at Reddi’s incubator at the rich neighbourhood of Jubilee Hills. With Ram, who has 14 years of experience in hardware systems and embedded software, the firm developed a product and hit the market with initial lot in 2010, providing content for Classes 3 to 10. A year later, it began selling the product at retail stores such as Landmark and Himalaya.
Edutor’s first generation product, Edutor Advantage Home Learning Device, was launched in March 2011 in some schools in Hyderabad and Bangalore. They sold more than 2,500 devices. Meridian School in Hyderabad was the first school to adopt this solution – for Classes 8th, 9th & 10th. Up to 700 students studying in these classes will now be using Edutor’s Tablet Solution in school and at home. While the tab was priced at Rs 5,500 a piece, the content (In all major streams such as State Boards, CBSE and ICSE, it sold at Rs 1,500 per class). It, in fact, is not an easy task for them to start. Akaash was just coming in and prices of tablets are set to be dropped significantly.
Ram, however, firmly believes that the cost of the device is not a big issue. “It is convenience for students and comfort for teachers in getting quick feedback on the learning experience that counts. A teacher can tell apart, why a student is getting fewer marks, why he is reading more or not reading a lesson. They can also appreciate the proportionate marks one gets vis-à-vis the time one spends on a subject,” he said.
Ram says that the school in general and teacher, in particular, has control over the tablet. They can decide what all the apps a student can access . “We offer curricular, co-curricular and extra-curricular content. We have also tied up with Next Education, University of Cambridge and Britannica for content,” he points out.
The school can decide whether the student can access the Internet and what to access there. “We can, say, fix only Wikipedia or a few dictionaries, if they choose to opt for them,” he says.
There is already a crowd out there. Even some general tablets are offering educational content. How is he going to address this? Ram says he is firm believer in the story – right content to right students with full control over the device to teachers. “We know we stand out with the content-plus-device formula,” he adds.
What he is betting on – a recession proof idea! “Yes, you cannot stop studying in times of recession. We are there to address this need,” he quips.