UAE’s Edfundo Eyes US$1.5m Seed Funding As Early Round Exceeds Expectations
Friends & Family Funding Round Closes At $400k
Educators Rally To Back Smart Money Management App Investment Opportunity
The co-founders of Edfundo, the world’s first teacher-curated smart money management app for tweens & teens which is due for launch in the UAE in the new year, have opened the next US $1.5 million funding round with a target to close it during Q1 2022.
This follows the closing of the initial friends and family funding round at 12.5% over subscribed with the offer raising US $400,000.
Co-founders and former teachers Simon Wing, CEO and Andrew Toward, COO, say the early round has attracted strategic investment from members of the region’s education community who want to back Edfundo’s foundational ethos of promoting financial literacy among the young and enabling them to access the digital economy.
“This is a really strong strategic funding round poised to catapult Edfundo to market. We have brought on board teachers, educators and academic advisors who have not just invested financially but also strategically as they strongly believe in our vision and mission and want to play their part in helping Edfundo through their contacts and networks,” explained Wing.
Aside from ensuring the Edfundo App is cutting edge, the first-round funding means Edfundo can connect swiftly with youngsters and parents and engage the crucial conversations around smart money management. The Edfundo team is already active via sports and in-school events which kicked off at Jebel Ali School’s recent Festive Fayre, according to Toward.
“The next round seed funding will be used to bring on key hires and grow the proposition throughout the UAE and then in other geographies throughout the Middle East and North Africa,” explained Toward.
Testing of the Edfundo app is to take place over the coming month with input from some of the 1,000-wait list user-base who have subscribed for the product via www.edfundo.com. “With the interest that is magnifying we expect this wait list to ramp up in the coming weeks providing a strong go-to-market testing user-base,” explained Wing.
Wing and Toward have developed the Edfundo app to promote financial literacy and enable smart money management among the digitally active children and youth. Fully managed by parents using flexible, built-in controls, the app can be used to motivate tweens and teens to save by earning, adding chores for ‘pocket money’ with simple, yet powerful dashboards that allow parents to track their youngsters’ spending and saving.
“This will be an essential tool for parents who are keen to see their offspring equipped with financial intelligence which will stand them in good stead for the future and see them better prepared to avoid the mental-health pitfalls which can come from poor money management and debt,” said Wing.
“We have to reverse the mistakes of the past and ensure that our youth are able to manage their finances from an early age and in a fashion aligned to the cashless, digital economy era. It is now ever more important with teenagers of 15 and above throughout the UAE now able, under the new juvenile part-time employment law, to take on paid work with the written consent of their guardians.”
With Edfundo, parents can set spending limits and rules, make automatic allowance payments and transfer money in real-time. “Edfundo offers a safe spending solution and budgeting tools to encourage financial literacy,” concluded Toward.
About Us
UAE-based teachers-turned-neobanking entrepreneurs Simon Wing and Andrew Toward invite seed investors as initial funding raises US $400,000 for Edfundo, the world’s first smart money management app for youngsters created by educators.
Edfundo is the world’s first money management app for kids and teens built by teachers and designed to champion a new era of financial literacy, digital inclusion, and mental wellbeing among the 8-18 age group. The smart money app, and its associated pre-paid debit card help ensure youth are stakeholders in the journey towards a responsible, cashless society.
Curated around the principle of ‘doing is learning’ the Edfundo app, which has rigorous parental controls, is highly interactive and fun, with gamification elements and rich and engaging educational content where users can learn good financial habits from budgeting to earning to saving.
In readiness for launch in the UAE in early Q1 2022, the Edfundo wait list is now open to youngsters and parents on www.edfundo.com. The co-founders are also planning further roll outs in 2022, including in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
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