PROFESSORBOB.AI, the AI-based virtual teaching assistant, raises €4Million from Innovacom and Inco Ventures
14 September 2022
Paris, 14 September 2022 – Innovacom, a venture capital pioneer in France, and Inco Ventures, an expert in impact investing, are acquiring a stake in Stellia. The start-up is developing a virtual teaching assistant that harnesses artificial intelligence to help students learn faster and more effectively. Thanks to this solution, Stellia aspires in particular to help lower the school drop-out rate.
Dedicated to supporting innovative tech start-ups that stand out as trailblazers in the environmental, economic and industrial transition, Innovacom is acquiring a stake in Stellia through its “Avenir Numérique” fund. Fund manager Inco Ventures is also participating in this €4 million funding round, led by Expen.
Created in 2019 by Samy Lahbabi (École Polytechnique) with support from the CNRS (French National Centre for Scientific Research) and the Paris-Saclay Technology Transfer Acceleration Bureau, the Stellia DeepTech programme has developed an artificial intelligence tool based on highly innovative Natural Language Processing (NLP) technologies.
The solution is able not only to teach and interact with students by asking and answering questions, but also to customise learning formats depending on the aptitudes and difficulties of each individual learner. Students thus learn more quickly and more effectively: the results of an A/B testing study centred on one of the company’s clients demonstrated that students using Stellia solutions learn twice as fast and exhibit significantly higher overall rates of academic success. Thanks to this innovation, the start-up aims to fight against early school leaving.
Hosted by the École Polytechnique, Stellia is rolling out several complementary SaaS solutions among academic institutions and training providers in France and abroad, including the French National Distance Learning Centre (CNED), Apprentice training centres in the automotive sector (in partnership with the French National Automotive Training Association – ANFA), as well as Arizona State University, with the aim of enhancing learning effectiveness:
- A Knowledge Assistant available 24/7 to offer relevant answers to more than 80% of students’ questions.
- Adaptive Learning: Stellia adapts students’ learning pathways to ensure that each student can lean at his or her own pace, focussing efforts on concepts that have yet to be mastered.
- Knowledge Anchoring: Stellia sends each student quizzes at regular intervals (time-based repetition) to ensure lasting consolidation of previously acquired knowledge.
- AI generation of activities and exercises: Stellia technology makes it possible to transform any type of textbook or course document into knowledge trees, as well as thousands of fill-in-the-blank activities, multiple choice questions and other exercises.
“Education will have to progress more in the coming decade than in all of the past century. Thanks to AI, knowledge modelling and customization of learning pathways, we aim to support the digital revolution in education while making equitable, inclusive and high-quality education available to all,” said Samy Lahbabi, founder and CEO of Stellia
“The service developed by Stellia teams offers an unprecedented opportunity to adapt teaching structures to the needs of every student, regardless of the subject being taught. In this regard, digital technologies truly benefit society. That is the prime focus of our investments, side by side with disruptive technologies that contribute to the major environmental and industrial transitions of our time. We are very glad to be supporting Stellia in its development and the roll-out of its solution in France and the United States,” added Alban Nénert, Innovacom Associate.
“Pursuing a civic-minded goal of helping a million struggling learners by 2025 thanks to cutting-edge technology, Stellia perfectly embodies the impact-driven DeepTech company of tomorrow. We are proud and excited to be guiding this team as it sets out to conquer world of inclusive education,” concluded Carole Cazassus, EdTech Investment Officer at Inco Ventures.
about Stellia
Created in 2019, Stellia develops a virtual teaching assistant that allows students to learn more efficiently and faster, thanks to state-of-the-art Artificial Intelligence technologies including Automated Language Processing (NLP / Natural Language Processing). Stellia aims to make learning and training accessible to millions of learners around the world, by supporting them in a personalized way throughout the learning process, regardless of the discipline taught. In a few hours, Stellia’s technology can transform bodies of knowledge from any discipline and professional skill into thousands of questions and answers.
