Project description
A human-machine approach to university applications
Students require guidance and orientation in the university application to increase their chances of getting into the right school. It is estimated that nearly 2 million international students seek the assistance of agents, which operate in a market that is considered fragmented and non-transparent. In this context, the EU-funded Unispotter project will develop the first education agent mobile end-to-end solution using a human-machine approach. Its aim is to automate and personalise the application journey while reducing workload and cutting costs for both students and universities. The project expects to reach more than 3 million students by 2024. It will also reach out to universities in Europe, North America and Australia.
Objective
Unispotter is the first education agent mobile end-to- end solution providing global student recruitment from one source using a human-machine approach to automate and personalize the application journey at the same time, while reducing workload and cutting costs for both students and universities. Unispotter transforms higher education admission and disrupts the education agent marketplace by delivering all of its services via an app and automated processes: university program scouting, application document preparation & delivery, and enrolling. There are over 4 million globally mobile tertiary education students, with 1.7 million students seeking placement support services worldwide and this number is set to increase. By 2024, Unispotter’s total available market is predicted to reach 3.4M students seeking guidance ( meaning a ~ €6.8b in revenue potential considering an average commission of €2000/student placed), of which Unispotter will lock 2% of the market (~€136M). Initially Unispotter plans to target prospect partner universities in Germany and Austria (home markets), and the UK, Australia, Canada & US (the world’s largest markets for international students), and then set on further EU markets. Bringing the Unispotter platform to TRL9 from TRL 6 today, and approaching commercialization by 2020, Unispotter will require funding in the range of €2.4 million which it plans to lock from private investors and validating support from SME Instrument Phase I and II. Unispotter already has the human resources to complete the commercialization plan. Christoph Trost (co-founder) and his team of 5 already grew Unispotter app downloads in Austria & Germany from 0 to 100K. Unispotter anticipates rapid employment growth and reaching 21 full time employees at launch in 2020, including 2 more in the next 6 months.
Fields of science
- social sciencessociologygovernancepublic services
- social scienceseconomics and businessbusiness and managemententrepreneurship
- social sciencespolitical sciencespolitical transitionsrevolutions
- engineering and technologyelectrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineeringinformation engineeringtelecommunicationsmobile phones
- social scienceseconomics and businessbusiness and managementemployment
Programme(s)
Funding Scheme
SME-1 - SME instrument phase 1Coordinator
1020 WIEN
Austria
The organization defined itself as SME (small and medium-sized enterprise) at the time the Grant Agreement was signed.