Startup Mantra: Listen2RE helps students crack exams

Government jobs are undoubtedly most lucrative in India. Consider the 32 lakh forms filled out by students in Maharashtra alone each year for the many exams the Maharashtra Public Service Commission (MPSC) holds for various positions. However, given government employment is not growing, just 0.20% of applicants are selected for such posts, and the figure is unlikely to increase.

What could be the motivation that drives so many students to spend important years of their life chasing these jobs? This question led Sujit Chankhore and Aishwarya Patil, co-founders of Zerton Education Technologies, to witness the struggle of these aspirants. This experience prompted the entrepreneur-duo to launch an audio platform ‘Listen2RE.’

The platform helps aspirants preparing for competitive exams to ease the burden of studying books, revising, and remembering the content and to relax after the exhaustive daily routine.

In the beginning

Mechanical engineers by education, Sujit from Buldhana and Aishwarya from Nashik met in Pune in 2020 and later got married. Says Aishwarya, “I came to Pune in 2010 for my education at DY Patil College in Akurdi. After graduating, I started teaching students in Nashik and did this job for four years. While doing it, I also started exploring the startup world and entrepreneurial journey of founders, how small businesses are making it big.”

Sujit said, “I was studying in MIT Alandi and participated and won awards in some national level events. Thereafter I pursued my post-graduation M Tech from Mumbai’s Sardar Patel College of Engineering. There too I guided some students for national events and then started working as a teacher advisor. While working with L&T in the research and development team, I got a chance to visit MIDCs in Gujarat and Maharashtra. This industry-academia interface made me realise that placements happening on the marksheet-basis should not be the case. Students should be assessed based on their skills and hence I decided to do something about this.”

“I developed an ERP platform for all engineering colleges where the hidden talent and skills of students would be discovered. Mentors were assigned for every department or a batch of students to identify their skills. They had onboarded 25 engineering colleges with more than 35,000 students listed. They were able to monetise the platform in just two semesters but then Covid-19 outbreak happened and they had to stop their operations. They tried to revive it but after the second wave they permanently shut it down,” added Sujit.

Audio market

Sujit wanted to do something in the growing audio market. Aishwarya says, “Audio medium was earlier dominated by radio channels but now they have podcasts, streaming apps and hence audio is growing fast. Unfortunately, most of the content on these channels and platforms is only related to entertainment or to some extent literature. While discussing this they came to realise that those students who must read educational books, do not have any other option of listening to those books. That is when the concept of ‘Listen2RE’ was born.”

Research

The primary research conducted online by Sujit and Aishwarya gave them interesting insights in the world of competitive exam preparation market. Aishwarya states, “Each student attempting any of such exam reads one book at least 8 to 10 times. Which meant students were consuming repeated content. Minimum content and maximum revision were their fundamental principle. They also came across one interview of one such exam topper who had read a 950-page book for 37 times in the least possible time. With these insights they started with about 50 books and later came up with a list of 100 must-have books which needed to be converted in audio format. It was about 2,000 hours of content, but they thought since it would be a one-time effort to create the content library, they should continue and figure out later how to provide this content to their intended users. They thought they could sell audio books individually to students but then faced the stark reality that students preferred buying books than buying their audio books since it was expensive alternative for them.”

Publishers consent

Sujit and Aishwarya’s next big task was to convince book publishers to grant their consent for converting their content in audio format. It took more than eight months for the duo to get the consent for some publishers.

Sujit said, “The publishers were fearing that once an audio book comes into the market, students will not purchase the hard copies and later the tech-platform would eat up their entire business. Since they could not convince them initially, they decided to undertake another survey to gauge the student sentiment. They interviewed 72 people over the phone. The survey results were an eye opener as students responded that they will always read a physical copy of any book and then if available they would go for audio content for revision. The reason behind this was students trusted the publishers more and they wished to verify the audio content by studying the book in first place. They also interviewed candidates who had been selected for the posts after clearing competitive exams. Of them, 60 per cent respondents stated that they had created their own audio notes and listened to it while commuting or at functions where they could not carry books in hand. Since, it was in their own voice and tone, they did not find it difficult to revise.”

Aishwarya added, “It took us more than 20 meetings per publisher to convince them and finally they did allow us on a revenue-sharing basis.”

Content library

As publishers were being onboarded and student suggestions coming in, Aishwarya setup a studio in Nashik in April 2022 and began recording content with the help of voice-over artists. Aishwarya said, “It took us eight months to record, edit and finalise 600 hours of audio content. A few books are such that the average length of their audio recordings is 45 hours. While they used professionals to record audio for books, they have relied on ‘senior’ students for their audio notes.”

“We have also given the playback speed adjustment feature (1.5x) which students can opt for saving their time. They would also like to provide analytical insights for individual users for their self-assessment,” added Aishwarya.

Mental health top priority

While Sujit spent time with students at their hostel, he also observed certain other things. Of the 80 students in the hostel, 58 were preparing for the competitive exams and of them 6 had sleeping disorders, anxiety, stress, lack of concentration, focus and other issues.

Says Sujit, “We identified 15 such problems and discussed it with some experts. As per their suggestion, they thought students should take out minimum 10 minutes for meditation and 20 minutes for exercising which will help them stay fit. Now the next challenge was to provide this through their platform. So, they decided that they would have some inspirational songs in the morning slot and some motivational songs in the evening hours. To let students, relax and have a calming effect before sleeping, they have ‘Pasaydaan’, a world peace prayer on their platform. The first three months statistics have been encouraging on this front.”

Scaling up

Discovering the right price point is one of the important things that Sujit and Aishwarya are looking at presently. The duo stated, “We have observed that students take subscription just one month before their exam to save on money. Those who have taken annual subscription are working professionals including teachers and police personnel. Since they are paying royalty to the original book publishers, they cannot reduce the price below a certain point. They are yet to find a solution regarding this. They are going back to their subscribers to gather feedback on improvising the platform in order to increase their reach in the serviceable obtainable market.”

“We have deliberately focussed on the Maharashtra market for now instead of targeting the pan-India market. Their successful strategies will be implemented across other regions,” they added.

Penn dumps Barstool for ESPN-branded sports-gambling service

Online sports-betting company Penn Entertainment Inc. sealed a $1.5 billion deal with Walt Disney Co.’s DIS, +0.05% ESPN to launch ESPN Bet, a branded sportsbook for fans in the U.S., and pivoted away from Barstool Sports on Tuesday, selling the platform back to founder Dave Portnoy.

Penn Entertainment PENN, will rebrand its current sportsbook and relaunch as ESPN Bet in the fall in 16 legalized-betting states where Penn is licensed.

The rebrand — which includes the mobile app, website, and mobile website — sent Penn’s stock soaring 13% in after-hours trading Tuesday. ESPN Bet will benefit from exclusive promotional services across ESPN’s platforms, including access to ESPN talent, the companies said.

Penn will pay ESPN $1.5 billion over 10 years as part of the strategic partnership, and will grant ESPN $500 million of warrants to purchase about 31.8 million Penn common shares, with additional bonus warrants possible.

 “Together, they can utilize each other’s strengths to create the type of experience that existing and new bettors will expect from both companies, and they can’t wait to get started,” Penn Entertainment Chief Executive Jay Snowden said in a release. 

Penn also said it has divested 100% of its stake in Barstool Sports to Portnoy, allowing the sports media platform “to return to its roots of providing unique and authentic content to its loyal audience without the restrictions associated with a publicly traded, licensed gaming company.”

For Penn, the ESPN partnership represents “a clear step up from Barstool in terms of mass appeal…and minimal regulatory risk,” according to Wells Fargo analyst Daniel Politzer, who said it was a “nearly impossible challenge for a publicly traded, licensed gaming company” to own “a media platform that thrived on viral/provocative content.”

Still, he said in a note to clients that “it’s premature to conclude this is a game change” since past partnerships between online sports-betting companies and media players have come up short of what initial fanfare would’ve suggested.

The news sent rival DraftKings Inc. shares DKNG, +2.09% sinking about 5% in after-hours trading.

 The decline in DraftKings shares comes as they’ve advanced 178% so far in 2023, through Tuesday’s close. Two analysts upgraded DraftKings’ stock just this week.

See more: DraftKings’ stock has nearly tripled this year — and it just won a new fan

Disney shares rose fractionally in after-hours trading.

Mike Murphy contributed to this report.

Cupola Partners With Avaya To Roll Out Region’s First AI-Powered Enterprise Learning Platform And Meet Customer Demands

Cupola Teleservices, the Middle East's pioneer in outsourced contact center services, has rolled out the first AI-powered enterprise learning platform in the region, using technology from Avaya (NYSE: AVYA). The platform delivers advanced enterprise learning and training capabilities customized and personalized to the needs of Cupola’s growing pool of customer service agents, enabling it to build a strong talent pipeline and keep pace with its customers’ ever-evolving demands.

Cupola is headquartered in the UAE and offers technology-enabled outsourced business support solutions to some of the region’s largest public and private sector organizations, including multinational banks, well-known technology brands and local public utilities. 

“Thanks to the progressive strategies to grow and diversify the region’s economies, coupled with nationalization drives, the business outsourcing industry is seeing a considerable increase in demand for customer experience services as well as national customer service agents. For us as a major source of employment opportunities, their goal is to not only exceed nationalization quotas, but also, train and upskill their team in the fastest way to ensure they are ahead of the demand curve,” said Sajjad Hamid, Chief Commercial Officer at Cupola. 

“For this, they partnered with Avaya to custom-build an intelligent enterprise learning platform that allows us to not only stay ahead of the demand curve, but also maintain and grow their excellence in delivering superior customer experience to their clients.”

The Middle East’s business process outsourcing market is growing healthily. Data Bridge Market Research believes that the market will post a compound annual growth rate of 6.9% between 2022 to 2029, and is expected to be worth over $20 billion by 2029. Cupola is harnessing this growth as a homegrown UAE brand that provides high quality customer experience services relevant to the region. It has also placed considerable importance on achieving expertise in quality standards including the Global Star Rating System and the Dubai Model for Government Services.

“Ultimately, we’re in the business of people, technology and expertise – their clients look to us to ensure that their own customers are being given the experiences they expect. This can only be achieved when they have the right people, with the right expertise, available. That’s where the learning experience platform comes in – it’s enabled us, very quickly, to seamlessly onboard, upskill and train their agents on the core competencies they need to deliver great experiences,” said Hamid. 

With the platform, Cupola is able to quickly onboard customer service agents and empower them with the knowledge they need to deliver outstanding customer experiences. It also enables agents to continuously upskill themselves, on their own time, enhancing job satisfaction and career progression. 

Cupola’s agents now have access to offline and online courses through a single dashboard, eliminating the need to schedule appointments or align with a timeline for learning and training. And new joiners use the platform to onboard and acquaint themselves with the core policies and values of the company’s they’re serving. 

“Many of their customers in the region outsource their customer experience to BPOs like Cupola. Specifically, the government sector sees great value and efficiencies in delivering citizen experiences through this model. It is their role to ensure that both sides have the right technology to deliver those unique outcomes. They have seen Cupola ‘s business growing over the past few years and they are delighted to continue this partnership as the needs of the group and of its customers evolve,” said Yaser Alzubaidi, Vice President – specialists Organization, Avaya International. 

In October 2021, Avaya and its partner, Toolwire, launched the Spaces Learning enterprise platform, with the promise of helping private and public organizations in their nationalization efforts. Built on Avaya Spaces, the modern workstream collaboration (WSC) platform, Spaces Learning is a fully integrated teaching and learning platform that transforms into a virtual classroom to provide training programs and exams on demand. The platform is built using Avaya Spaces’ open APIs to combine AI and video conferencing tools to help employees personalize their learning sessions.