Singapore-based edtech Cialfo gets $40M led by Square Peg and SEEK

Making use of to schools is among the hardest components of highschool, particularly for college kids who wish to examine overseas. Cialfo needs to make the method simpler, with a platform that features college analysis, communication instruments for counselors and college students, and Direct Apply, which helps worldwide college students discover and apply to a whole lot of packages with a single utility kind.

The Singapore-based edtech introduced at the moment it has raised $40 million in Collection B funding, led by Sq. Peg and SEEK Investments.

The spherical, which additionally noticed participation from returning buyers SIG International, DLF Ventures, January Capital and Lim Teck Lee, brings Cialfo’s complete raised up to now to to $55 million, together with a $15 million Collection A introduced in February 2021.

The corporate at the moment has greater than 170 workers in Singapore, India, america and China, and is partnered with about 1,000 universities around the globe, together with Imperial School London, the College of Chicago and IE College in Spain.

Ciaflo was based in 2017 by Rohan Pasari, Stanley Chia and William Hund. The workforce advised TechCrunch in an electronic mail that Pasari was prompted by his personal experiences as a scholar. He grew up in India and his highschool didn’t have a profession counselor. Consequently, college students had been left to navigate the faculty utility course of on their very own.

Pasari initially needed to go to a four-year college in america, however his mother and father couldn’t afford the excessive worldwide scholar charges, so he utilized to colleges in Singapore as a substitute, getting a full scholarship to Nanyang Technological College (NTU). Earlier than graduating, Pasari helped his sister and a few of his buddies by way of the faculty utility course of, which planted the concept of launching a enterprise in his thoughts.

Pasari initially began an schooling consultancy agency with Chia, working with about 200 college students at its peak. However the two needed to make use of tech to scale up their operations, in order that they offered their schooling consultancy in 2017 and used the proceeds to launch Cialfo.

The corporate operates on a B2B mannequin, promoting subscriptions to colleges. School counselors then invite college students onto the platform, which folks or guardian have entry to as properly.

“Our mission has all the time been to assist a million college students of their journey of getting faculty prepared. We consider there are three pillars required—entry to data, personalised help and monetary assets—and convey the entire three collectively will allow the democratization of schooling,” the workforce advised TechCrunch.

The brand new funding shall be used to develop Cialfo’s international person base, add extra options and take a look at potential acquisitions.