Magnus Gyan is an education technology company dedicated to bringing affordable, accessible education technology to the students and teachers of Brazil.

Like so many developing nations, Brazil faces major obstacles when it comes to education. The average student:teacher ratio is 35:1, and while the numbers are better in private schools than in public ones, 90% of the country’s 56 million students are in the public school system. Students are paying the price for the crowding, as they are unable to get the individualized attention and guidance they need, and fall behind, disengage, and ultimately drop out as a result.

At Magnus Gyan, we believe that technology has the potential to radically alter the landscape of education in Brazil, and in other countries like it. So we're setting out to make that technology available, and that is where the Magnus Gyan story begins.

Magnus Gyan's mission is to improve the quality and availability of education in Brazil by providing high-quality, low-cost educational solutions to the country's middle-class students.

Coupled with interactive and adaptive educational software that provides individualized learning and real-time analytics, Magnus Gyan's hardware empowers students to learn independently and enables educators to teach more effectively.

With Magnus Gyan, lower & middle-class students have the ability to access limitless amounts of information with the touch of a finger, from school, at home, or on the go — all without breaking the bank. Magnus Gyan software is both interactive and adaptive, so as users progress through the curriculum, the software adjusts to target each students specific needs.

The result: more engagement, more motivation and more progress, as students are empowered to take ownership of their own educational destinies.

Magnus Gyan's content strategy is three-pronged, each marked by an below:

Target the English language learning segment through our own adaptive platform, Edusynch.

Edusynch
Edusynch is a mobile-first, adaptive self-assessment tool specifically targeting the TOEFL exam. The company was recently selected as 1 of 54 companies out of a pool of over 900 applicants to receive a development grant from Startup Brasil, an initiative funded by the Brazilian Ministry of Science and Technology. EduSynch is currently nearing the final stages of development, and on track for a final product launch by the end of October or early November. 

Identify local Brazilian content players with a strong existing presence in market as potential acquisition candidates.

Faceduc
Faceduc is Brazil’s first private, platform-independent localized social learning platform, designed to provide pedagogical content and education-focused media to students and facilitate nationwide student-professor and student-student interaction. The platform was developed by Amabrasil, Magnus Gyan's NGO partner based out of São Paulo, and is to be used for public projects as the software complement to Magnus Gyan's hardware.

Mentes Notáveis
Mentes Notáveis is a student-centric online portal with 7,000 users across 50 schools throughout Brazil. Their gamified platform focuses on Portuguese, Mathematics and Literacy training for grades K-6 through interactive games, video classes, and assessments delivered in on a safe and secure online platform. They are currently finalizing the native Android version of their product. 

Mobile L
Mobile L is an interactive, cloud-based authoring and learning platform. The company has developed 8 seperate modules, all accessible via their online portal and all requiring no prior knowledge in programming or development: Mobile application development, ebook development, general programming,  game development, teacher training, 3D modeling, online courses and online assessments. 

BrainOn
brainon is an online platform designed to assess and improve the cognitive abilities of students. Through highly detailed analytics as well as advanced psychological pedagogy, the firm has developed games and exercises for students to practice and improve specific cognitive weaknesses to help them learn more effectively in school. 

Connecta Mundo
Connecta Mundo is an online closed social network designed to facilitate interaction between teachers and students. The platform promotes easy sharing of content from third parties, as well as learning objects ranging from lesson plans, books, videos, music, and any material a professor decides to upload. The company adapts the platform's design and interface based on the age of the user and provides detailed usage statistics for teachers and parents. Students can also engage in creating and sharing interactive projects and learning objects through the platform.

Localize best-of-breed educational content players from India and Israel.

Next Education
Based in India, Next Education has invested over $100 million in developing interactive, adaptive content for grades 6-12. They offer 2 platforms -- LearnNext and TeachNext -- and have 6,000 partner schools currently signed up and 6 million students engaged. Magnus Gyan is the exclusive Next Education licensee for Brazil.

Learni
Israel-based Learni engages students and teachers in a secure, closed social learning network generated over any existing content. The platform offers real-time, formative assessment and control, as well as powerful analytics tools to measure and compare achievements and social interactions. Magnus Gyan is in discussions to acquire the exclusive Learni license for Brazil.

Magnus Gyan's products were developed in partnership with two leading institutions in India:

The Indian Institute of Technology, Jodhpur (IITJ) worked as Magnus Gyan's exclusive advisor for Brazil to develop the first version of the Magnus Gyan tablet in an effort to provide what was deemed the 'last person' connect - a low-cost device with which any student in any location can connect to the internet

EAFT was responsible for the technology transfer from IITJ to commercialize this device, meaning the company holds the intellectual property for the device's architecture and design. Magnus Gyan has a 5 year exclusive license for thes devices in Brazil.

At a manufactured cost of just $75, the Magnus Gyan tablet (left) offers all of the quality & specifications of the $400 Samsung Galaxy tablet (right) in Brazil. 

The tablet’s hardware and system architecture are designed specifically for intensive education applications, and the device is constructed to withstand high humidity, varying temperatures, and generally harsh environmental conditions. All Magnus Gyan products are vetted by IITJ, as well as Underwriters Laboratory, USA, a global leader in the assessment and testing of electronic devices, to guarantee quality and performance.

Magnus Gyan tablets come in two sizes - 7" and 9.7" - and are  fully customizable according to our clients' needs, including the logo, colors, boot-up screen, selection of preloaded software, and certain specifications, including camera, and battery, screen resolution. The 7” Magnus Gyan tablet is already on the market, while the 9.7” model is being registered with the Brazilian electronics authority, Anatel. Additionally, MG is in the process of registering one of the first dual sim 3G embedded 7" tablet in Brazil.

Magnus Gyan is already making tremendous progress toward our goal of making affordable interactive learning tools accessible to middle-class students throughout Brazil.

To date, Magnus Gyan has launched 2 successful pilot programs in the public sector, totaling 1,500 students and 100 teachers, as well as 1 private sector project with LF Educacional, the publishing arm of Brazil’s leading English language learning institution, Cultura Inglesa Rio de Janeiro, totaling 2,000 public school teachers in the city of Rio de Janeiro.

As of July 2014, Magnus Gyan has sold approximately 2500 units of our tablets. That number is expected to grow rapidly, since we have many prospects, in both the public and private sectors, in the pipeline. Magnus Gyan recently signed an MOU with Fastshop, a local USD $1 billion (sales) retailer, to help the company develop its new B2B departments focused on education and corporations. We are also in talks with the state of Pará, the location of our 2 pilot programs, to expand the Magnus Gyan solution statewide. The governor of Pará has already approved a 12,000 unit tablet project of which 2,000 units is expected to be purchased in Q1 2015.

Kartik Kilachand, CEO
Kartik is a serial entrepreneur with more than 20 years of experience in US-India business. He is the co-founder of Tasty Bite, the #1 brand of ready-to-eat Indian food in the United States, as has served as CEO and Co-Founder of World BPO/ITO Forum, the leading US-based offshoring platform for vendor-client interaction.

Shawn Landgraf, President
Shawn is the co-founder and former President of TSI Broadband, a market leader in commercial broadband services, as well as CEO of Magnus Associates, an education-focused management consulting firm. Shawn has extensive family contacts and channel relationships in the education markets on both a domestic and international scale.

Robert Janssen, Managing Director
Robert is senior advisor to the federal government for Brazil IT export programs and 1 of the top 5 internationalization specialists in BRazil. Robert has served as CEO of Outsource Brazil, one of 9 companies selected for the first-ever government-sponsored accelerator program, Startup Brasil.

Sean Kilachand, CEO and Founder, EduSynch
Sean graduated from Brandeis University in 2011 with a double-major in Economics and Computer Science and has over 5 years of experience in programming and technology.