Ep 7: Alliv Samson (Kami) on going from failing to raise a follow-on round from early investors to a massive (partial) trade sale

This podcast is all about the funding journey of Kami, a digital classroom platform used by 90% of US K-12 schools. The conversation is between Anna Guenther, co-host of The Funding Files and co-founder of PledgeMe, and Alliv Samson, one of the co-founders of Kami. 

Alliv delves into Kami's beginnings in 2012 as a university project called Notable, designed to make lectures more interactive. Initially, they faced challenges in monetizing the product and gaining traction, leading to a pivot from targeting university students to focusing on PDF annotation for a broader audience. 

Alliv shares the company's early funding experiences, from a $10,000 seed round in 2013 to subsequent rounds through local and international investors to a partial sell out in 2024 and huge returns for investors. 

She emphasizes the importance of product-led growth, driven by user feedback, which eventually led them to focus on the EdTech sector around 2016. A pivotal moment was attending an EdTech conference in the US with support from a Education New Zealand grant, where they discovered the specific needs of teachers using Chromebooks and digital textbooks - and had one of their users literally cry at the reduction in her workload thanks to their product.

The conversation highlights Kami's organic growth, achieving profitability and cash flow positivity before seeking further investment. In 2019, they raised approximately $1.9 million New Zealand dollars to scale their operations. The COVID-19 pandemic caused explosive growth, with sign-ups reaching a million users a day. Alliv also shares the story of Kami being recognized as one of Time Magazine's 100 most influential companies in 2020.

Alliv discusses Kami's trade sale where investors like NZGCP made around a 75x return on their investment. A highlight of their funding journey was getting Sam Altman from OpenAI to invest in. A low point was when their initial investors didn't want to invest more money after the first year of the business.

Interested in what Kami are doing? you should work with them! Check out their current jobs here: https://www.kamiapp.com/careers/

--

Kia ora and welcome everyone to THE FUNDING FILES, where we explore the highs, lows and cashflows of funding a business in Aotearoa New Zealand.

Huge thanks to the founders for sharing their stories, to our board for inspiring us to make this pod, and to Rory Harnden for making our design and intro string.