Big tech companies and startups want to use generative AI to build software and hardware for kids. Many of these experiences are limited to text or audio, which children may not find appealing. Three former Google employees hope to overcome that hurdle with Sparkli, an interactive app powered by generative AI.
Sparkli was founded last year by Lax Poojary, Lucie Marchand, and Myn Kang. As parents, Poojary and Kang were unable to satisfy their children’s curiosity or provide engaging answers to their questions.
“Understandably, kids are very curious, and my son asked me questions about how cars work and how rain falls. My approach was to use ChatGPT or Gemini to explain these concepts to a 6-year-old, but it’s still a wall of text. What kids want is an interactive experience, and this was our core process behind founding Sparkli,” Poojary told TechCrunch over the phone. told.
Before launching Sparkli, Poojary and Kang co-founded a travel aggregator called Touring Bird and video-focused social commerce app Shoploop at Google’s Area 120, Google’s internal startup incubator. Poojary went on to work in shopping at Google and YouTube. Marchand, CTO of Sparkli, was also one of the co-founders of Shoploop and went on to work at Google.
“When a child asked us 50 years ago what Mars looked like, we might have shown them a picture,” Poojary said. “Ten years ago, we might have shown kids videos. With Sparkli, we want kids to be able to interact and experience what Mars is like.”
The startup said the education system often lags behind in teaching modern concepts. Sparkli wants to teach kids about topics like skill design, financial literacy, and entrepreneurship by creating AI-powered learning “expeditions.”
The app allows users to explore predefined topics in different categories or create a learning path by asking their own questions. The app also highlights one new topic every day for kids to learn something new. Children can listen to the generated audio and read the text. One topic chapter combines audio, video, images, quizzes, and games. The app also creates a choose-your-own adventure where you don’t feel pressured to answer questions right or wrong.
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Poojary said the startup uses generative AI to create all media assets on the fly. The company can create learning experiences within two minutes of a user asking a question, and it’s looking to reduce that time even further.
The company said that while the AI assistant can help children learn certain topics, its focus is not on education. To make the product more effective, the first two people it hired were a teacher and a PhD in education science and AI. This was a conscious decision to keep pedagogical principles in mind and ensure that the content better served children.
One of the main concerns regarding children using AI is safety. Companies like OpenAI and Character.ai are facing lawsuits from parents who say their tools encourage self-harm in children. Sparkli said certain topics, such as sexual content, are completely prohibited on the app, but when children ask about topics such as self-harm, the app tries to teach them about emotional intelligence and encourages them to talk to their parents.
The company is piloting the app in partnership with an educational institution with a network of schools serving more than 100,000 students. The company’s current target audience is children ages 5 to 12, and it tested its product in more than 20 schools last year.
Sparkli also built a teacher module that allows teachers to track progress and assign homework to children. The company said it was inspired by Duolingo to make the app engaging enough for kids to learn concepts and want to return to the app often. The app has streaks and rewards for kids who complete lessons regularly. We also provide children with quest cards based on the initial avatar they set up to learn different topics.
“We’ve had a very positive response from the school pilot. Teachers often use Sparkli to create exploration plans that kids can explore at the beginning of class, leading to a more discussion-based format. Some teachers have also used Sparkli to create (homework) after explaining a topic to let kids explore further and gain some understanding,” Poojary said.
The company wants to work primarily with schools around the world in the coming months, but hopes to open up access to consumers and allow parents to download the app by mid-2026.
The company has raised $5 million in pre-seed funding led by Swiss venture firm Founderful. Sparkli is Founderful’s first pure edtech investment. Lucas Wender, the company’s founding partner, said the team’s technical skills and market opportunity prompted him to invest in the startup.
“As a father of two kids who are currently in school, I see my kids learning interesting things, but not subjects like financial literacy or technology innovation. From a product standpoint, we thought Sparkli could take kids out of video games and help them learn things in an immersive way,” Wender said.
