Korea’s Riiid raises $175M from SoftBank to expand its AI-based learning platform to global markets
“AI is eating the world of education,” Riiid co-founder and CEO YJ Jang notes in his biographical description on his LinkedIn profile, and today his startup — which builds AI-based personalized learning, including test prep, for students — is announcing a major funding round to help it position itself as a player in that process.
Seoul-based Riiid has closed a funding round of $175 million, an equity round coming from a single backer, SoftBank’s Vision Fund 2.
The funding is coming at a high-watermark moment for edtech — with the shift to remote learning in the last year of pandemic living highlighting the opportunity to build better tools to serve that market, and a number of startups in the category subsequently raising hundreds of millions of dollars to tackle the opportunity. Riiid plans to use the investment both to expand its footprint internationally, a well as to expand its products.