Here is how Edu-tech startups can benefit from joining Founder Stack by Accel

The Founder Stack programme at Accel is now launching its second cohort for Consumer Tech startups, and is calling applications for the same. The applications close before 20th October, 2020.

Over the years, we at the Accel community have backed companies like Vedantu, Edupristine, SplashLearn, Openhouse among many others in the education technology space. 

We have travelled with these companies from Seed to Scale stages. Over time, we were able to build a credible network of subject-matter experts, operators that came with high levels of contextual insights and learning. 

Now, with our Founder Stack programme, we would like to open this pool of learnings and network to early-stage Edutech founders. 

Some of the segments that our community portfolio operated in include online tuitions and marketplaces, after-school learning, Mathematics learning and Certifications-based classroom and online learning.

Our program is curated to help you answer the common questions faced by Edu-tech founders.  

After doing our research and due diligence, our community has identified a set of a few core problems and bottlenecks Edutech startup founders face during the first 500 days of their business. Some of these problem statements and the subsequent observations include:

• B2B2C has been the traditional route in Edutech over the years. Though it looks like it could be a tempting approach towards rapid scaling, history shows that B2B2C is a hard route. 
  

What would be the right go-to-market strategy for the startup’s offering? 

• On the other hand, despite the solidity the products might come with, B2C is always a segment that comes with the strings of aggressive sales and heavy marketing efforts.
  

How can Edutech founders crack this conundrum?

• When it comes to GTM strategies, Edutech startups often come across this classic problem of who should they be focusing on - The Parent, the Students, or the Teachers. 
  

How can founders identify what the appropriate user persona might be, that will adopt the startup’s product offerings?

• With so much variance and diversity with the existing products in the market, early-stage Edutech founders are compelled to showcase better competitive outcomes. 
  

Are the customers willing to pay for these new offerings? If yes, how deep is the real willingness of the users to pay for them?

• Balancing engagement and an exceptional learning experience for every peer and child is a challenge. 
  

How can startups build with scalable models that come with strong unit economics?‍

How FS can help Edtech founders

The programme will have over 30+ coaches from across the industry who are proven entrepreneurs and subject matter experts, that have seen tens of thousands of consumers using their products.

The programme also provides access to the portfolio founders and operators from within the Accel Community. These coaches have agreed to spend time with the participants, and offer their support to the founding teams as part of the cohort. 

The duration of the program is 12 weeks, and we intend to facilitate a maximum of 10 founding teams in this cohort. 

Download the programme details here.

The shortlisted teams of the cohort will have access to four types of sessions - 

• Sounding boards, Private roundtables on the Tuesdays of every week
  

• Masterclasses and Founder sessions on the Thursdays of every week. 
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On the other days, the founding teams get to interact with the coaches on seperate AMA blocks, community nights and dinners, and category-specific discussions. 

The goal at Founder Stack is to help these teams in their pre product-market fit stage, with everything they would need to go to the market.

The approach is derived down through the various layers of Founder Stack: Market Research Layer, Product Layer, User Growth Layer, and the Presentation Layer.

Some noted Edutech coaches and experts in this programme include Vamsi Krishna (Vedantu) and Ravi Bhushan (Brightchamps), and Anand Daniel, Abhinav Chaturvedi, Subrata Mitra, Ajay Sethi, Kiran Hota , Manasi Shah from the Accel team who have looked at Edu-tech extensively over the last decade.

Get access to the learnings from our portfolio startups: Vedantu, SplashLearn and Openhouse

If you are a Edutech startup founder trying to build products around online learning, peer learning, marketplaces, certifications and all things education and its intersection with technology, visit here.

How can you join ?

Applications are currently open for founders to be part of the life long community. Deadline for the applications is October 20th, 2020

Please check www.seedtoscale.com/consumer to get more details.

Related Articles:

1. What can you expect from 10 Weeks of Founder Stack for SaaS Startups?
2. How is the Founder Stack Program designed for Consumer Tech startups to become growth ready?
3. How Founder Stack can help early-stage Fintech startups surpass their challenges and go to the market

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