SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Piper, a leading STEM education company that empowers inventors of tomorrow through technology-driven play, closed $7.6 million in Series A funding led by Owl Ventures, a VC fund focused on edtech innovators. Piper’s first product, a DIY computer kit, inspires creative confidence and empowerment by seamlessly transforming kids’ passive technology consumption to active learning through problem-solving skills. The new funding will help Piper build an expanded ecosystem of products that allows children of all ages to continually expand their STEM skills. Additional investors include past participants Reach Capital and Stanford’s StartX fund, as well as a new incoming investor, co-founder of Guitar Hero, Charles Huang. The Piper Computer Kit is available via major retailers and directly from the Piper website.
Piper aims to combat the overwhelming use of passive screen consumption that youth are prone to today. Kids 8 to 12 years old are spending a scary amount of passive screen time consuming technology — an average of four hours and 36 minutes a day, to be exact. This time ramps up to over six hours a day for teens. Too much screen time for older children is associated with problems including psychological stress, difficulty with social interaction, and bad grades. Piper’s Computer Kit allows kids to play an active role with technology, building and learning rather than mindlessly consuming content.
“The Piper Computer Kit transforms kids typical experience with technology, giving them the power to create, versus empty, passive screen time consumption. We’ve seen Piper kids grow in computing and engineering skills, and in their confidence to take on all kinds of challenges,” said Mark Pavlyukovskyy, co-founder, and CEO of Piper. “Owl Ventures has a reputation for helping education technology companies scale their businesses, which makes them the perfect partner to help battle the passive screen time consumption epidemic, as we bring Piper to more kids, both in school and at home.”
About Piper:
Headquartered in San Francisco, CA, Piper is an award winning STEM education company empowering inventors of tomorrow through technology-driven play. The Piper team is led by Princeton graduate Mark Pavlyukovskyy and MIT graduate and Stanford fellow Joel Sadler. Piper launched in 2014 and raised $10.1 million in funding from Owl Ventures, Reach, and Stanford’s StartX Fund. The Piper Computer Kit helps kids build in the United States and in over 750 schools worldwide. Piper is the leading STEM educational toy on Amazon, and is available to consumers via major retailers including Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Toys”R”Us and directly from the Piper website.
