GapoWork

https://landing.gapowork.vn/

Which of the following categories best describes your solution?

What makes your solution innovative?

In the complicated situation of the Covid 19 epidemic in Vietnam and globally, digital transformation in education is necessary. If schools, teachers, and students can not adapt, education will stagnate, and students might lose the opportunity to have a decent education, affecting future generations.

- The transformation to the online teaching and learning model is a current trend, and certainly not only at this time, but the form of online teaching will also gradually replace the traditional education in the next 5-10 years.
- Our product is the opening for this 4.0 education revolution. We provide solutions so that schools can adapt to the current situation, even in the future when the epidemic can break out unexpectedly, teachers and students can adapt immediately without panic.
- The pain points that teachers and students are facing (lack of teaching management tools, insufficient technical knowledge, etc.) will be handled by Gapowork.

Have you tested your solution’s approach? If so, how?

- We have approached many schools in Vietnam, from primary school to university or private schools. Currently, schools have used GapoWork products as an operating platform in online teaching and learning. More than 17,000 teachers and students are already using GapoWork.
- The results show that online teaching activities have become more effective, the quality of teaching sessions is better. Besides, the school saves a lot of time in notifying the regulations and timetables to students.

Describe the core technology that powers your solution.

Our product is software which can be used flexibly on computers and mobile devices.
We give each school a workspace, creating an internal social network for teachers and students to work. Each member has a personal account where can exchange, interact, post to share with other members. Each class can create a group, which can help students update information in real-time. 

+  Zoom integrated on GapoWork has all the features of Zoom business on the market, such as recording lessons, poll votes, QnA, etc and supporting create online classrooms for up to 300 people, unlimited meeting time.

+ Chat system, General group, Video call, Livestream support extensive interaction. They help teachers and students easily exchange information quickly and conveniently, connect more multi-way.
+ Recognition feature: this helps administrators to recognize teachers, teachers to record students. With timely recognition, people will be motivated to strive more in teaching and learning.
+ Survey feature: Every semester, teachers will need to send a survey to students and parents about the quality of teaching. It usually takes time and costs to print, but you can do this on GapoWork extremely quickly, get instant feedback. 
+ Organization chart feature: it helps the school easily manage the teaching system. School leaders can quickly access the information of each teacher and student. Teachers can easily add a list of courses and classes to a general group, chat group with just a few taps without adding each student one by one.

What is your theory of change?

The use of social media for collaborating learning has a significant positive association with online knowledge sharing behavior (β = .583, p < 0.001), meaning thereby that the more intense use of social media for collaborative learning by students, the more knowledge sharing between peers and colleagues. Also, interaction with the teacher seeing the significant statistical positive association with students engagement (β = .450, p < 0.001), telling that more conversation with teachers leads to a high level of students engagement. Similarly, the practical interpretation of this result is an expected 4.5% increase in students’ participation for every 10% increase in interaction with teachers. Interaction with peers has a significant positive association with students engagement (β = .210, p < 0.001). Practically, the finding revealed that 10% upturn in student involvement, there is a 2.1% increase in peer interaction. There is a significant positive association between online knowledge sharing behavior and students engagement (β = 0.247, p < 0.001), and finally, students engagement has been a statistically significant positive relationship with students’ performance (β = .972, p < 0.001), this is the clear indication that more engaged students in collaborative learning via social media leads to better students’ performance.
Link research:https://slejournal.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s40561-020-00118-7

Which target population(s) does your solution address?

• Learners to use at home
• Parents to use directly
• Parents to use with children
• Teachers to use directly
• Teachers to use with learners
• Used in public schools
• Used in private schools
• School leaders

What are the key characteristics of your target population?

• Children & Adolescents
• Rural
• Peri-Urban
• Urban

If you selected Other, please explain here.

We bring tools to support educators, school leaders and students who have difficulties in teaching remotely because they are used to traditional learning methods.

Which categories best describe your main EdTech product or service?

• Communication, collaboration, and networks

In which countries will you be operating within the next year?

• Vietnam

How are you measuring your progress toward your impact goals?

We use the Monthly active user (MAU) index to measure the way against the target KPI.
That is the number of active users in a month across the entire platform. In addition, we are also interested in the following two indicators: Active ratio of total employees of a school/organization, Time on platform, Customer service rating.

What are your impact goals for the next year, the next three years, and the next five years? How will you achieve them?

- In 2022, we have a target of 1 million MAU on the platform. In 2023, we have a target of 5 million MAU, going global in the next five years.
- Our mission is to provide schools and organizations with comprehensive online learning and teaching solutions, helping to increase internal connections between organizations and promote equality in learning opportunities for students in Vietnam in general and the region in particular.
- Vision: GapoWork will be the first choice when schools and organizations look for an effective online teaching and communication support platform.

What barriers currently exist for you to accomplish your impact goals?

• Other

If you selected Other, please explain here.

- The limitation that we face is the lack of internet systems, computer and phone equipment in remote schools, many areas do not have wifi to use the platform. Organizations, the Government and the Ministry of Information and Communication, will find a solution to overcome this problem. 

Describe these barriers as they relate to your solution. How do you plan to overcome them?

Collaborate with NGOs and third parties to reach more schools in the area. Contact the volunteering units to be able to bring wifi and combiner to schools in remote areas. If this technical infrastructure problem can be solved, deploying GapoWork will become very simple.

Please provide a brief history of your organization. What was the motivation behind starting your organization and/or the development of your solution?

1. A brief history of the organization: 

- G-Group - a Financial Technology Group, was born in 2016. We focus on investment and development in finance and technology, operating with 11 subsidiary companies and a team with more than 1000 employees. Currently, our product has about 30 million users.
We initially developed this platform for business only, but then we found that schools and students also faced difficulties in teaching and learning during the Covid-19 pandemic. Schools need a solution to improve interaction and connection between teachers, parents, and students. Therefore, we built and developed this product with easy-to-use, friendly and close-to-user interfaces that help them quickly grasp and overcome technological obstacles.

- We started to work on this project in 2019; Gapowork was published in May 2021.

2. The driving force behind developing our solution is:
- Realizing the need for a technology solution to support connection and interaction for the school and student network. However, schools, students, and teachers are still unable to adapt to this digital transformation revolution. They face difficulties as the pandemic drags on, the demand for teaching and learning online is increasing. Besides, the economic problem makes schools struggle to optimize ed-tech tools to support teaching.

- We provide tools to support online teaching and learning, communication, and interaction within schools, thereby solving the needs of schools and students. This solution we bring to schools: From primary schools, junior high schools, high schools, universities, private schools, educational centers, organizations."

What type of organization is your solution team?

For-profit, including B-Corp or similar models

How many people work on your solution team?

- Our team has about 200 people.
- Besides, we are oriented and supported by G-Group - a financial technology group with 11 subsidiary companies, 30 million users. 

How long have you been working on your solution?

2 years

How are you and your team well-positioned to deliver this solution?

- Our team is a collection of experienced and enthusiastic people. Each member has their strengths and comes from the cultures of companies in the technology industry. We have a common goal of creating a product with real value for the community, and we have worked and devoted ourselves to that goal.
- We own an IT and Product team with more than 100 people who are true warriors and ready to work day and night regardless of holidays to ensure progress.
We have a strong, experienced Business Development team in the field of Edtech and B2B. We also have a dynamic Marketing team, many ideas, and an understanding of market insights. Besides, we own a dedicated customer care team, always support customers 24/7, they are hardworking bees, always want to bring the best to customers. In addition, our Back office team is also very respectful, who build and develop a strong corporate culture. We respect the three core values of the company: Listening and sharing, User focusing, and Integrity. With a strong in experience and culturally unified, it is not too much for us to claim that we can accomplish all goals.

Provide an example of your Team Lead’s ability to conceptualize and implement a new idea.

Our Team Lead is the CEO, named Ha Trung Kien.
He is the founder as well as co-founder of some outstanding projects in Vietnam, such as:
- CPO of Appota
- CPO/CEO of Appota Pay
- COO, Head of Product Technology of Trust Circle/Oriente
- Co-founder of DK Online Network Solution from
- Vice President of Applistar Corp in Hanoi/Tokyo

Appota - a company that raised $10 million in Series C funding, Appota focuses on building an entertainment ecosystem that consists of 6 key business sectors: Game Publishing, Advertising, Online Entertainment & Esports, e-wallet.
Trust circle is a fintech company acquired by Oriente, Gpay is a payment intermediary company, an e-wallet invested by KBbank of Korea..

What organizations do you currently partner with, if any? How are you working with them?

We recently became a strategic partner with Zoom Global - the globally popular group meeting application. Besides, we also provide free Zoom service on the GapoWork platform for 1000 businesses and schools, large schools such as Can Tho University, Vietnam National University, Thuyloi University, and many primary, secondary and high schools nationwide.

We reach out to Union members in 64 provinces and cities by cooperating with the Ho Chi Minh Youth Union Central Committee, currently, GapoWork is the preferred platform for deployment within the central union system. In addition, the Ministry of Information and Communications also uses GapoWork to communicate about the Covid epidemic to its subordinates.

Why are you applying to the Octava Social Innovation Challenge?

We took part in the Octava Social Innovation Challenge to spread the product to Southeast Asia - a potential market that we will hit soon. 

The barrier is that in remote areas, the internet system and computer/ phone equipment are scarce. We need partner organizations to support us. Our product can also interact with potential customers through the contest and learn more experiences from other ed-tech products.

In which of the following areas do you most need partners or support?

• Network connections (e.g. government, private sector, implementation communities)
• Public Relations (e.g. branding/marketing strategy, social and global media)
• Product / Service Distribution (e.g. expanding client base)

Please explain in more detail here.

- Network connections (government, private sector, implementation communities)
- Public Relations (branding/marketing strategy, social and global media)

- Product / Service Distribution (e.g., expanding client base)

As mentioned above, the problem we face is the lack of the internet, computer/telephone, and infrastructure in remote areas. Therefore, we need the support of the government and public community organizations to help schools and students in remote areas have the opportunity to use the product.
Besides, in the regional markets, we cannot fully understand the customer insight, which will become simpler when organizations or 3rd parties provide know-how about the market. Thus, the activities to reach target customers, such as branding, global media, etc., will be based on that to implement.