DouDou Wins GMIC’s G-Startup Competition

GMIC isn’t all about panels and keynote speeches, there’s also a startup competition. This year, a startup called DouDou took home the win for its app, a platform to facilitate communication between parents, kids, and teachers.

As seems to be the tradition at startup competitions, DouDou’s Melody He took a victory lap by delivering the company’s pitch again — this time on GMIC’s main stage. She said she was inspired to create the app because she began to feel out of touch with her child, who wasn’t great at communicating what was going on at school each day. Positioned as a solution to that, the DouDOu app primarily features a messaging solution, a calendar, and a photo sharing platform, with the idea being that parents and teachers update this so that each knows what is happening with the child at all times. Teachers can notify parents of issues, post photos, and mark events on the calendar, and parents can similarly share what’s going on with their kids at home.

Ms He said that the app is designed to be easy for teachers, saving them time by giving them prewritten photo captions and the option to quickly tag all students in a photo. As a former teacher, it’s hard for me to imagine a teacher who is trying to keep twenty kindergarteners in line having the time to even open the app, let alone take and tag photos, but He says the app has been doing well. It’s currently in testing at a private school where 90 percent parents “familiar with the App Store” — whatever that means — have adopted it. Apple has also showed some interest in including the app in some of its education programs.

DouDou is currently looking for investment, so if you’re a VC with children you’re struggling to keep track of, DouDou may be right up your alley.

This post is part of our coverage of GMIC 2012.