Prague-based Readmio, which develops interactive children’s story apps with sound and learning features, has secured €1 million in new funding from Simpact Ventures, with support from ZAKA VC, Zero One Hundred, and DEPO Ventures, as Vestbee was informed.
- Founded in 2020 by Slovak entrepreneurs Ilya Novodvorskiy and Jozef Šimko, Readmio is a digital storytelling platform that develops interactive fairy tales and educational content for children. The app’s library contains over 3,277 stories in nine languages, including English, Slovak, Polish, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Czech, and Hindi.
- Using an offline voice recognition system, Readmio detects when a parent reads aloud and automatically adds synchronized sound effects and music, from chirping birds to crackling fires, to enhance engagement.
- Each story includes educational activities such as comprehension quizzes, discussion prompts, coloring pages, and printable worksheets, providing both entertainment and learning opportunities.
- The app has been downloaded by over 2 million users in 135 countries, with more than 300,000 monthly active users and 50,000 families holding paid subscriptions. Readmio is available on iOS and Android, allowing children to listen to pre-recorded stories or enjoy interactive reading sessions with their parents, supporting language development, literacy, and cognitive skills.
Details of the deal
- Readmio will use the €1 million investment to accelerate its global expansion into Asia, the US, and Latin America, and to enhance its app’s features and user experience. The funding will also support the development of new content and tools that make storytime more interactive and educational, helping the company reach more families and inspire children through imaginative, engaging storytelling.
“We believe in the Readmio team’s growth vision. We understand each other well. The technology is successfully entering new markets and users rate it highly. Our investment will enable faster product development and, above all, faster scaling into new markets such as India, China and other Asian markets,” says Krzysztof Grochowski, Partner at Simpact Ventures.
