Kartik Sarda- The Founder and CEO of Saathi Global Education Network shared the success story of his company with The Global Hues.

Saathi Global Education Network is a multi-service platform designed specifically to ease the process of International Collaboration for schools around the world, with the goal of building leaders of the future who can understand, accept, and respect each other.

Two key services provided by Saathi GEN:

Officials can create detailed school profiles to search other schools matching their requirements for collaboration. Normally, an international collaboration between schools takes weeks due to logistical challenges. However, with Saathi GEN, all these issues can be mitigated and collaboration can happen in seconds!
Some of the company’s flagship features include Hot Schools Wire (where schools can share news and events), Trust Meter (an intelligent algorithm that rates schools based on their verification and activity), and Detailed School Profiles.
Virtual Voyages – They help interconnected schools to collaborate virtually by pairing groups of students and guiding them through various projects to inculcate important skills required in the professional world – teamwork, communication, leadership, peer-review, research, critical thinking, exposing students to multiple international cultures while learning about more than 160 global issues that need resolving. Students get certified to help them with scholarships and college admissions. Teachers or school officials are not involved in the process except the initiation of the program. This attracts students for exchange or study abroad programs, awards, grants, global recognition, media traction, and networking. With Saathi GEN it is easy to collaborate with hundreds of schools at once.

“Virtual Voyages are being carried out manually by our team, and will be available on our online platform later this year,” said Kartik.

Transforming the outlook of education

Saathi Global Education Network is going to bring a massive change in global education, especially as the young generation adapts to the new learning methods post-COVID-19. Few ways by which they are transforming education are:

Bringing schools closer to each other through collaborations, thus pushing for centralized learning systems throughout the world with common goals and assessments for students.
Providing students with a professional skill-set at an age as early as 13, making them capable enough to start working full time in any general role including marketing, design, research, analytics, writing, coding, and doing the groundwork. “We make sure that students are well equipped with the demands of modern work settings and are comfortable working in diverse teams,” explained Kartik.
Setting new metrics for colleges to assess students. The company’s five-year vision is to become the universal standard for measuring student success.
Bringing immense attention towards global issues and problem-solving. Students gain empathy towards others’ problems.
Saathi GEN is going to be completely free for all students once the platform is live. This is HUGE for parents who want to provide their students with international education but can’t afford it.

Scaling the start-up idea to execution

“Adaptability is easily the biggest strength that has pushed me forward in every situation,” said Kartik. Kartik’s personal experience gave him the ability to adapt to various environments. Starting Saathi GEN was the riskiest move of his life. Being able to come up with innovative ideas with the support of a strong and capable team makes him 100% sure that Saathi GEN can be the greatest Ed-tech company on the planet.

“It is only going to get more difficult as we expand our operations, but we thrive under pressure and have a thirst for new challenges,” explained Kartik.

Differentiating Factors

Saathi GEN does not encourage corporate competition but instead helps all stakeholders in the education sector connect. They connect other Ed-tech and E-learning companies to schools, students, and parents, help NGOs to find online volunteers, help colleges find students, and students to find their goals.

The Clientele

The company deals in both B2B and B2C. The primary users are schools and students, while secondary users are businesses that provide useful tools and services to them. Trust is the most important currency for Saathi GEN. The company ensures users’ unbreakable faith by

Ensuring that all users are verified, active and serious about using the platform.
Not tracking user data and making sure that all users feel safe when sharing information on their platform.
Providing legal support and templates to schools.
Ensuring solid support staff and an extremely intuitive user interface.
Providing complete transparency and also giving options to hide certain information from other users.

Ensuring the best workforce

Saathi GEN is providing training and certification to teachers. They are providing priority support to all schools joining this year and assigning mentors for students in each collaboration.

Impact of New education policy

There have been both positive and negative impacts. Due to the recent changes, schools are too occupied with adjustment and thus unable to respond. On the other hand, the rigid education system focusing on exams and grades will now be shifting towards more holistic development of their children.

Impact of Covid-19

The growth due to covid-19 is logarithmic – steep early and flat later in Kartik’s opinion. However, with more and more schools going virtual, e-learning should keep growing until too much content is available for free. Soon the market will saturate with many ERP, LMS, E-learning, and other companies coming in place.

Company and Team Ethos

User experience is the priority, along with quick customer support.
User data protection is of utmost importance, and we do not use it for any commercial purposes.
Making sure that all employees feel well paid, have flexible schedules & learning opportunities, and a balanced lifestyle.
The team consists of social entrepreneurs. “We will make sure that a kid in the remotest part of the world can taste the highest quality of education without spending a single penny on it,” stated Kartik.

Awards and Milestones

Top-50 Companies in Education award from Global Forum for Education and Learning.
Selected in the Centurion start-ups stage for Innopreneurs by Lemon Ideas.

Visions and Future Prospects

“To create a generation of global citizens who understand and accept each other irrespective of their differences. We aim to remove unemployability throughout the world and bring the whole world together. Our logo represents global peace and diversity.

We expect to grow at a tremendous rate and capture a large share of the global market within the next 3 years,” said Kartik.

Words of Advice

To quote Nike – Just do it! Don’t waste time in planning, fearing failure, finding support, just start executing.
Learn from mistakes. Spend time in networking. Put yourself under pressure. Ignore the skeptics.
Keep hitting the door and one day it will break.