Naandi Education Support & Training, better known as NEST, a social impact company, has announced that it has managed to secure a follow-on funding round of ₹4 crore from Michael & Susan Dell Foundation.
Apart from that, the company has also secured funding from Anand Mahindra, chairman of the Mahindra Group. NEST Education is a technology driven, social impact focused company.
The company says that it will use the newly raised funding to widen its outreach programs and achieve the goal of educating 100,000 students by financial year 2022.
Commenting on the investment, Anand Mahindra said,
Entrepreneurial efforts like NEST that combine technology and centre-based coaching to aspiring children and youth are the best way to upgrade human capital in our country today.
Debasish Mitter, country director of the Dell Foundation, said,
We find the ability of NEST to aggregate content from around the world and to deliver multiple products through their centres very appealing.
NEST Education owns and operates, high quality learning centres under the brand name Alphabyte – The Learning Terminal. It works on an unique ‘Tech-N-Brick’ education model.
Alphabyte aims to upgrade human capital across urban India. The company claims to be using technology to fast track learning of each and every individual through customized learning modules that are curated from the best knowledge providers across the globe.
The Michael & Susan Dell Foundation was set up in 1999. As of 2010, the foundation has given more than $650 million to children’s issues and community initiatives in the United States, India, South Africa.
Michael & Susan Dell Foundation believes that the education challenge in India is due to the lack of access to financial products and services for an estimated 280 million people. Far too many of India’s low-income families are still unbanked which limits the necessary incentives for entrepreneurship and engagement in the economy.