This Indian edtech startup is diving deep into China, US, Philippines. Here’s how

Aspiring Minds co-founders, brothers Himanshu and Varun Aggarwal

After almost exactly 8 years of helping Indians find jobs, Aspiring Minds has decided to take its services wordwide.

India has several startups trying their hands at the job searching industry, but this edtech startup for the unemployed is expanding across continents. China, the Philippines, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Tanzania are all on its list, and that’s just for now, co-founder and CEO Himanshu Aggarwal tells Tech in Asia.

The expansion has been in the works for a while and resulted partially from popular demand and partially due to the realization that job-matching services are needed in countries outside India too.

“When I looked at countries with a large and growing working population, like China, the Philippines, Indonesia, parts of South Asia, and so on, it was very clear that the challenge [of finding work] was prevalent in all these places,” says Himanshu. “There was clearly a lack of information around about how to match people and jobs.”

Co-founded in 2008 by Himanshu and his brother Varun Aggarwal, Aspiring Minds uses a combination of assessment, programming, voice recognition, simulation, and other technology to help match job seekers up with employment that’s a good fit for their skills and expertise. The company’s main product is AMCAT, or the Aspiring Minds Computer Adaptive Test, a test that evaluates cognition, language, behavior, and job skills.

The company came onto our radar in October of last year when it launched a US$1 million seed fund for education and employment technology startups. The fund was set up to aid India’s workforce, particularly millennials, who are going to school in droves but having trouble finding jobs after graduation. It had plans then to invest in India, China, and the US. Since then, they’ve added a few countries to the list.

Jobs across borders

The startup’s expansion is happening across countries, but the plan started with the Philippines.

“It was quite interesting because a lot of the customers [we had] in India had large businesses in the Philippines,” Himanshu explains. “They started talking about how we should offer similar services in the Philippines. That got us excited and got us looking at the Philippines early on.” Within the country, Aspiring Minds is making sure of its AMCAT test but also using SVAR, its product that evaluates English speaking, listening, and comprehension, useful in a country that is home to several call centers.

The other countries followed, with varying degrees of difficulty. The Philippines and the US were among the easiest. The company’s foray into Tanzania, its first African country, is one that Himanshu describes as “experimental.”

“We are confident that Africa as a market is going to emerge over the next few years, and right now, the aim is to have the right learning and the right models so that we can work with the movement as we start to see traction across the continent,” says Himanshu.

Aspiring Minds is currently working in Tanzania in partnership with ZoomTanzania, a classifieds and business directory (something like Craigslist) to match job seekers up with future employers.

Strong foundations