Social Impact Ventures invests in educational innovator Bomberbot

Social Impact Ventures (Social IV), the largest private social impact fund in the Netherlands, is investing EUR 750.000 in educational innovator Bomberbot. The company, operating in the Netherlands and in Finland, offers a teaching method and educational games to help children between eight and twelve to develop their ’21st century skills’. With Bomberbot, children can develop basic programming and computational thinking skills, which will help them to better understand the impact of technology in the world around them. Bomberbot actively supports elementary schools and teachers with the integration of the Bomberbot methodology, enabling all primary school teachers to integrate the program easily into their curricula. With this funding round, Bomberbot has secured over € 1.2M in investment and will use Social IV’s investment for product development and expansion of the company. There are currently pilots in the United
States, Canada and Hong Kong. Bomberbot is being used by over 80,000 children and aims to reach more than one million children in the next five years.

For all children, by all teachers
For Social IV, which previously invested in – among others – Taxi Electric and Afval loont, this is the first impact investment in the field of education. The investment in Bomberbot is primarily based on the accessibility and wide availability of its software and programs. Both are offered through the traditional educational system and are therefore available to all children. Social IV- partner Warner Philips says:
“Bomberbot is a very innovative company. Its active involvement with schools that use the products is really unique. Teachers can implement Bomberbot products into their curricula, without a specific background or education. The fact that the Bomberbot-method is available to every young child makes it really impactful.” Cristian Bello, CEO and co-founder of Bomberbot: “Technology influences our lives at a scale never seen before and digital education needs to be available to everyone, it is our mission is to
provide as many children as possible with an understanding of the enormous opportunities of digitalisation and technology.”

21st century skills
Jacques Eijkens, former CEO of Sanoma Learning, is co-investor in Bomberbot and an advisor to the management board. “The need to acquaint children at a young age with 21st century skills is an important trend in education. They must understand the consequences, chances and threats of technology and digitalization to be successful in life. This is not part of the regular elementary school curriculum, but Bomberbot is changing this in a very accessible way. Because of the usability of the Bomberbot-method there is no need to specifically train teachers or develop separate courses. Every elementary school teacher can now prepare his or her students for the digital future. “

About Social Impact Venture NL
The Dutch investment fund Social Impact Ventures (Social IV) invests in fast growing, ambitious socialenterprises who have a financially sound business model and a positive and measurable impact on people and the environment. In addition to funding, Social IV offers support in the field of strategy, impact optimization, marketing and sales, supply chain, HR, legal and governance, to help impact companies in which they participate be successful. Since 2015, Social IV invested in Taxi-Electric, 1% Club and Afval Loont. It has the ambition to participate in around 15 social enterprises with its EUR 40 million capital to support their (international) expansion.