
Ninestars
72 Greams Road, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, 600006, India
Overview
Ninestars is an IP-driven Digital transformation industry leader. Ninestars helps Media, Publishing, Communication & PR, Government, BFSI and Publishing industries to redefine consumer experiences, strengthen their digital core, embrace digital transformation, and realize the full potential of their content.
- Total investments
- 1
- Lead investments
- 0
- Investments · 12mo
- 0
- Active investors
- 0
Sector focus
- Data Visualization
- Publishing
- Software
Investment portfolio
- Speakaboos
Participated · Series B · Nov 2014
Speakaboos is an educational technology company that promotes learning for children through interactive media and early literacy products. Its recently launched reading app for early childhood literacy features a catalog of over 200 interactive stories categorized by children’s interests, with illustrations, animated characters and story-driven touch-screen interactions. The app is available on computers, tablets and mobile devices. Speakaboos’ content is distributed to thousands of children in homes, schools and libraries globally through strategic partnerships with education, media and technology companies. The company will use the funds for global marketing and customer acquisition initiatives. Led by CEO and co-founder Neal Shenoy and Chief Learning Officer Dr. Alice Wilder, Speakaboos has raised $25M to date. Speakaboos operates a mobile education platform that delivers a large catalog of interactive stories and songs for early childhood literacy and language learning across mobile devices, tablets, and laptops. The product is distributed to thousands of children in homes, schools, and libraries through strategic partnerships with major education, media, and technology companies. The company emphasizes pedagogically developed content aimed at building lifelong readers and reports rapidly growing subscriptions. Speakaboos plans to use its new funding to invest in product development and engineering, content development and licensing, expanded distribution, and marketing and customer acquisition. The platform is positioned for continued expansion in the digital literacy marketplace as demand for children’s digital reading grows. Speakaboos provides a subscription service that transforms licensed children’s books into interactive, age‑tiered storybooks with narration, animation, and comprehension-driven interactions. Its catalog includes about 150 books from over 15 publishers (including The Jim Henson Company, Pearson, Dr. Seuss, Penguin, Charlesbridge, and Abrams) and is growing at roughly 1–2 books per week. Parents can subscribe for $5 per month or $45 per year, and the company also offers school licensing (up to $2,500/year depending on size). Usage metrics reported include children completing 40 storybooks per month on average, nearly three hours of reading, over 85% completion of opened books, and a 75% 12‑month retention rate among subscribing parents and schools; Speakaboos has sold or pre-sold over 10,000 subscriptions. The company released its iPad app just over a month before the article and planned an Android launch in September. Speakaboos was originally launched to the web in 2009 and was incubated and initially financed by [212]MEDIA.
Team
No current team members are available.