Company: Synap
Founder(s): James Gupta and Omair Vaiyani
Website: https://synap.ac/
Description: Synap is an intelligent online learning and exam platform that enables organisations to deliver personalised, effective and engaging training and live exams at scale.
Synap facilitates fast acquisition of knowledge through micro-learning. The platform breaks down training into short, easily-digestible sessions, tailored to individual strengths and weaknesses, allowing users to learn in just a few minutes a day.
Synap’s proprietary spaced learning algorithms look at the areas that users need to focus on to create a personalised learning plan. Courses can be set up to send users a short daily quiz to review their weakest areas. This approach has been shown to improve long-term retention and understanding of information by up to 100%.
Synap began when Dr James Gupta and Dr Omair Vaiyani were studying medicine at the University of Leeds. Through developing the platform for their own revision, they realised that others could benefit from using Synap. The company was officially launched in 2014.
Synap partnered with Oxford University Press to provide exclusive online content to medical students and grew to be used by 25% of UK medical students; Synap is now used extensively by students and professionals from a wide range of industries all over the world.
Since its launch, around 80 million questions have been answered and the startup now have over 45,000 users accessing the portal daily, in 15 countries around the globe, including North and South America, Europe, and Asia Pacific.
Clients include universities, leading brands, and cutting edge startups, including Daimler, The University of Law, and The Medical Defence Union. Synap recently secured an exclusive 10-year deal with a university client which will see Synap launching across 15 campuses and developing an innovative set of online learning materials in conjunction with their professors.
Synap is ideal for Onboarding & Knowledge Transfer, as well as Compliance and Regulatory Training enabling companies to effectively implement and manage their training at scale.
Synap’s clients can also create, deliver, and proctor high-stakes exams – an invaluable feature as Covid-19 disrupts face-to-face education world-wide. For example, Synap helped South Africa’s University of the Free State deliver exams to over 850 law students despite challenges created by poor connectivity and slow internet speeds. Since 2020 the startup have delivered live exams for over 25000 candidates.
Synap’s team comprises an incredible range of talent including former teachers, data scientists, e-learning instructors, and videographers, meaning that Synap offers a complete end-to-end solution, including content development and commercial consultancy on the design of future courses.
In the last year, Synap signed 35 new clients; ARR is around £700,000 – a 100% increase on the previous year.
This year the startup found their place in the market. Synap want to keep providing clients with the tools they need to support remote learning and exams. Synap are working on building their insights and reporting to let students take control of their own learning.
Synap was named one of the Top 10 British AI companies to Watch by Business Insider and was a GP Bullhound Northern Stars winner in 2020.
