With the support of Swanlaab Venture Factory, Ship2B Ventures, Stella Maris Partners, Binomial Investments and business angels and previous investors, the edtech company Leemons obtains a new capital inflow of 1.5 million euros in what is already its third financing round.
The Edtech startup founded by Lula de León and Johan Sosa is moving forward in its aim to lead educational technology with a unique product in the market. As De León points out, “we sat at the top table with some of the most relevant VCs in Spain and Mexico; they saw the potential of Leemons to disrupt the sector and seize the moment”.
During the past 2023, the Leemons team has been developing the SaaS version of the platform and with this round, they are working on its internationalisation, with the intention of reaching different countries in Europe and the UK. In addition to operating the business, serving customers and growing in key profiles that reinforce the current team.
Swanlaab -specifically from Swanlaab Tech Fund II-, Venture Capital fund that leads the round with an investment of more than half a million euros, thus adds to its portfolio the second investment with the aim of adding six more this year. “From Swanlaab Tech Fund II, we expect to add to this investment from Leemons another 5 or 6 more representing €5-10M during 2024”, says Mark Kavelaars, managing partner of Swanlaab Venture Factory.
For this VC, it is necessary to continue investing in methodologies, content and systems that improve education and give more people access to knowledge and better quality learning processes. For this reason, Swanlaab has always shown interest in the world of education and, as Kavelaars points out, “Leemons convinced us from the first day because of their human quality, their technical quality and their vision. We believe that they can be disruptive in a sector that has not evolved much, where technology is not yet a protagonist and where current solutions do not solve the problems of educators, trainers and their students in the learning process in an agile and effective way”.
The Ship2B Ventures fund, which specialises in early-stage investment in startups in the greentech and edtech sectors or those that promote improving the quality of vulnerable groups, has also joined the capital inflow. As Jaime de Antonio del Castillo, Investment Manager of the venture capital firm, emphasises, “we are committed to proposals such as the one offered by Leemons, with a strong intention to improve student performance in order to reduce school failure”.
They also focus on the data and the situation in Spain in terms of school dropout rates. Ship2B Ventures, through the BSocial Impact Fund, supported by the EIF, Banco Sabadell and AXIS, has invested in 26 impact startups and expects to make around ten more investments in 2024.
Leemons was born in 2021 with the aim of offering a global platform to schools looking to digitise the learning experience and start working with an advanced data model that enables evidence-based decision making for teachers, students and school management. So far, Leemons has been running a stealth model with the aim of achieving a high level of development in record time and being of use to a somewhat saturated market. Lula de León explains the figures: “In 2021, we launched the product in open source and it has more than 14,000 downloads, of which approximately 10% have an active installation and are up and running”.
Both universities and vocational training centres that implement online or blended plans, as well as corporate training in companies, are the organisations for which the Leemons platform facilitates the digitisation of training. Without leaving aside those that work with face-to-face training, Leemons emphasises that “we are also prepared to be part of the day-to-day classroom in schools and other centres with face-to-face training”.