Brainly

Brainly is a Polish education technology company based in Kraków, Poland, with headquarters in New York City. It provides a peer-to-peer learning platform for students, parents, and teachers to ask and answer homework questions. The platform has elements of gamification in the form of motivational points and ranks. It encourages users to engage in the online community by answering other users’ questions. As of November 2020, Brainly reported having 350 million monthly users making it the world's most popular education app.[5]

Brainly, Inc.[1]
Type of businessPrivate
Type of site
Social network service
Available inHindi, English, Spanish, Portuguese (BR), French, Filipino (Tagalog), Turkish, Romanian, Russian, Polish, Italian, Indonesian
Founded2009 (2009)
HeadquartersNew York City, New York, United States
Kraków, Poland
Area served35 countries
Created byMichał Borkowski
Tomasz Kraus
Łukasz Haluch
Key peopleMichał Borkowski (CEO)
IndustryEducation
URLhttps://brainly.com
RegistrationNot required
Users350 million[2]
Brainly
Stable release
iOS

4.18.0 (November 6, 2020 (2020-11-06)[3])

Android
Varies with device (November 5, 2020 (2020-11-05)[4]) [±]
Operating systemiOS, Android
WebsiteiOS Android

History

Initially called Zadane.pl, the company was founded in 2009 in Poland by Michał Borkowski (current chief executive officer), Tomasz Kraus and Łukasz Haluch. The first million unique users monthly was achieved within 6 months after the release.[6]

In January 2011, the company founded Znanija.com, the first international project dedicated to Russian language speakers.[7] Several other versions in multiple languages for the following markets included Turkey (eodev.com), Latin America and Spain (brainly.lat) and Brazil (brainly.com.br).

In December 2013, seven new language versions of Brainly were released, including English (brainly.com), Indonesian (brainly.co.id), Indian (brainly.in), Filipino (brainly.ph),[8] Romanian (brainly.ro) and Italian (brainly.it) sites. Brainly was initially funded by the co-founders, but then raised funds from Point Nine Capital.[9][10]

In October 2014, the company announced that it had raised another round of funding from General Catalyst Partners, Runa Capital and other venture capital firms.[11] The total amount of the investment was $9 million and allowed further product development, as well as the opening of the US-based headquarters in New York City.[12][13]

In May 2016, another funding round of $18 million of combined debt and equity was disclosed.[14] In June 2016, Brainly acquired the US-based OpenStudy.[15][16]

In March or April 2017, Zadane.pl changed to Brainly.[17]

In October 2017, Brainly raised $14 million in the funding round led by Kulczyk Investments.[18] In January 2018, Brainly announced it had acquired the video education start-up, Bask,[19] to bring video technology to the Brainly platform.[20]

In July 2019, Brainly raised $30 million in a Series C funding round led by Naspers, with participation from Runa Capital and Manta Ray.[21] The total funds raised by the company since its establishment is reported to be $68.5 million. [22]

In 2020, the company experienced a rapid increase in the number of users fuelled by the global COVID-19 pandemic from 150 million in 2019 to around 350 million in 2020.[23]

In 2020, numerous users on Art of Problem Solving found that Brainly had compromised the integrity of the American Mathematics Competitions after posting the questions on its website with the correct answers. This led to Brainly updating its honor code.

Website

General overview

Brainly provides a platform where students, parents, and teachers help others with homework questions. Students use Brainly to strengthen their skills across subjects such as English, mathematics, science, and social studies. The platform allows them to connect with their peers, subject matter experts, and professional educators to discuss their subjects and seek answers to their questions. Users are asked to provide an explanation and a source for the answers they provide. Questions are categorized by subject, respective of country and school level.[24]

Gamification

Each user is given a fixed amount points upon registration, which are used to ask questions. Users can gain points by answering questions posted by others.

Ranks and Ranking

Brainly awards "ranks" to users who provide frequent, high quality answers. Some ranks are automatically rewarded for earning a preset number of points or a preset number of highest-quality answers to questions. Users may also apply for "special ranks," which may be awarded for answering questions in specific subject areas or for consistently thanks from other users. Additionally, the website bestows teacher ranks to professional teachers.

The website features users who have answered the most questions or earned the most points upon a set of leaderboards. The leaderboards cover timeframes from daily to quarterly.

Content moderation

Brainly is moderated by a community of volunteers and staff, as well as it uses Machine Learning algorithms to filter its Knowledge Base.[25][26] Moderators are given permissions to respond to users who violate rules, including individuals who plagiarize, post spam, or post assessment questions. Moderators typically have a superior track record of helping others on Brainly.

See also

References
  1. Android Apps by Brainly.co on Google Play, Google Play's statement. Retrieved approx. 9-14-2020.
  2. "Education app becomes world's number one after surge in popularity caused by pandemic". Archived from the original on 28 December 2020. Retrieved 27 November 2020.
  3. "Apple on the App Store". iTunes Store. 2019-05-02. Retrieved 2019-05-02.
  4. "Brainly Homework Help & Solver". Google Play Store. 2019-05-02. Retrieved 2019-05-02.
  5. "Education app becomes world's number one after surge in popularity caused by pandemic". Archived from the original on 28 December 2020. Retrieved 27 November 2020.
  6. Petrovich, Liesha. "With 80 Million Users, Poland-based Brainly is Changing Education". HuffPost. The Huffington Post Media Group. Archived from the original on 12 May 2017. Retrieved 31 January 2019.
  7. Degeler, Andrii (March 17, 2014). "Crowdsourced School Homework: Brainly Plans to Teach the US". The Next Web. Archived from the original on September 30, 2018. Retrieved June 18, 2018.
  8. "Tech in Asia - Connecting Asia's startup ecosystem". www.techinasia.com. Archived from the original on 2020-06-11. Retrieved 2020-06-11.
  9. "Social Learning Network Brainly Raises $500K From Point Nine Capital, Angels".
  10. http://www.pointninecap.com/brainly Archived 2014-05-29 at the Wayback Machine, Point Nine Capital
  11. O'Hear, Steve. "Schoolwork Q&A Site Brainly Scores $9M Series A To Answer The U.S. Expansion Question". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on 2016-04-19. Retrieved 2016-04-18.
  12. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2014-10-26. Retrieved 2017-09-08.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  13. CNBC.com, Elaine Pofeldt, special to. "Guess where a big crop of unicorns is coming from". CNBC. Archived from the original on 2016-04-01. Retrieved 2016-04-18.
  14. "Form D: Notice of Exempt Offering of Securities". US Securities and Exchange Commission. 25 May 2016. Archived from the original on 5 October 2016. Retrieved 3 October 2016.}
  15. "Brainly Acquires US Social Learning Platform, OpenStudy - EdSurge News". EdSurge. 2016-06-14. Archived from the original on 2017-10-18. Retrieved 2017-10-18.
  16. "Social Learning Platform OpenStudy Joins the Brainly Community". Press release. 14 June 2016. Archived from the original on 5 October 2016. Retrieved 3 October 2016.
  17. "Zadane.pl - Uczymy się w grupie". 2017-04-30. Archived from the original on 2017-04-30. Retrieved 2020-02-11.
  18. "EdTech Startup Brainly Closes $14 Million - NewsCenter.io". NewsCenter.io. 2017-10-26. Archived from the original on 2017-11-07. Retrieved 2017-11-02.
  19. "Bask". www.usebask.com. Archived from the original on 2019-01-30. Retrieved 2019-01-31.
  20. "Brainly acquires Bask to add video to its peer-to-peer learning platform for students".
  21. "Brainly, a crowdsourced homework helper for students, raises $30M to expand in the US". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on 2020-12-28. Retrieved 2019-08-22.
  22. "Brainly Funding Rounds". Crunchbase. Archived from the original on 2019-08-22. Retrieved 2019-08-22.
  23. "Education app becomes world's number one after surge in popularity caused by pandemic". Archived from the original on 28 December 2020. Retrieved 27 November 2020.
  24. Coleman, Alison. "Global Ed-Tech Disruption From Poland: Crowdsourced Homework". Forbes. Archived from the original on 2017-09-10. Retrieved 2017-08-25.
  25. Sawers, Paul (25 July 2019). "With 150 million users, Brainly raises $30 million to expand its social learning platform in the U.S." VentureBeat. Archived from the original on 5 August 2020. Retrieved 1 September 2020.
  26. "Who are Moderators?". Brainly. Archived from the original on 15 August 2020. Retrieved 1 September 2020.
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