Member Article

Lumici Secures Investment for Collaborative Lesson Planning Platform

29th November 2016 - Manchester-based education technology start-up Lumici has closed a £120,000 seed round for its online collaborative lesson planning platform, Lumici Slate.

Founded by former teacher and education technology specialist Atif Mahmood, Lumici Slate is transforming secondary school and college education by reducing the time spent planning lessons and streamlining the process with online collaboration tools. According to the Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL) four out of ten newly-qualified teachers leave the profession within the first year due to increasing workload and planning.

Lumici secured funding from a range of entrepreneurs following an Ignite accelerator workshop including Chris Haslam, founder of Manchester-based Drupal specialist Ixis, Bill Carr, David Wood, Stephen Pankhurst, Romilly Sinclair and angel investor Doug Scott of www.potential.co.uk. Ignite is Europe’s number one network of angel investors whose objective is to help develop new businesses through a series of mentoring programmes.

Lumici Slate features pre-built and fully customisable templates that can be shared with students as part of a classroom exercise, home learning or revision programme. Teachers can view real-time reporting to see which lessons have been accessed and how each student is performing. Students, teachers and parents also have access to an online lesson journey that maps out what subjects have been taught during the school year and what activities students have completed.

Atif noticed a distinct lack of suitable planning platforms on the market during his 10 years in the education profession. After spending time at the Alice Smith School in Kuala Lumpur, he applied his knowledge and experience to create Lumici Slate; one of the first collaborative tools on the market.

Atif Mahmood, founder and CEO of Lumici said: “There is a rapid adoption of tablet devices in schools and colleges and they are looking for an effective workflow solution. Lumici Slate has the capacity to scale as demand increases, and the potential to dominate the UK market before replicating this internationally.”

There are currently 4000 students and teachers using Lumici Slate, and that number is increasing week on week. The start-up is focused on reaching out to the 25,000 schools and colleges in the UK, with a target to be in 1 in every 5 schools within the next three years.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Lumici .