Cambridge-based EdTech startup PORGiESOFT releases EdTech AI Personal Assistants to solve education problem in Africa

February 22, 2020 18:55 GMT

Technology News Team

Using artificial intelligence and education research data for Africa, PORGiESOFT have created EdTech AI Personal Assistants. There have been many historical problems with the quality of education in Africa – as quality education is apparently very expensive in many African countries, but PORGiESOFT might have found an important solution as they’ve researched and developed personal assistants for education in Africa. The startup based in Cambridge UK wants to use technology to change the face of education in Africa and they believe they can use software engineering principles to intially simplify quality education and then subsequently use AI via a computer, a smartphone or tablet to deliver the frameworks, policies, tools and techniques that support quality 21^st century education.

During a recent interview with TECH Startups, George Brown, Chief Technology Officer at PORGiESOFT explained that: “In some countries in Africa, we noticed that the rate of illiteracy was sometimes more than 70% and many students, lecturers and teachers in these countries basically lacked 21^st century digital skills. We believe we can use artificial intelligence (AI) to close that gap in the market and really help these students and teachers not to get left behind. We are helping them by providing an AI personal assistant that is trained in quality education."

"We are constantly researching narrow AI for education but we are already using AI to automate and accelerate time-consuming tasks in education and we are also applying conversational AI to encourage students, provide emotional support, detect bullying, to provide objective career guidance, to help lecturers learn how to give balanced feedback comments to students and so on,“ he added. In the future, PORGiESOFT hopes that the technology its developing will help to improve education across sub-saharan Africa.

PORGiESOFT initially launched their EdTech AI Assistants SAMANTHA ™ and Dr JANE ™ in West Africa in 2019 and are already in discussions with potential key official partners and other governmental agencies that support education in Africa. They are planning on expanding to Central Africa and other regions in Africa using the same model they used in West Africa as a pilot for their SPACE RAIN project. The startup was founded in 2018 and is solving a pressing problem that is on the agenda of many international organisations and philanthropists. PORGiESOFT has since put together a strong team of computer scientists, researchers, education experts in cognitive development, computer engineers and data scientists to form a solid employee base for the EdTech startup's expansion plans.

TECH STARTUP: PORGiESOFT

www.porgiesoft.com