Tuesday, February 22, 2011

The Pitch

Firehoze brings video tutorials to STEM subjects

By Lynette F. Cornell

Firehoze Inc.
Headquarters: Cambridge
Phone: 781-214-1089
Email: chase@firehoze.com
URL: www.firehoze.com
Founded: 2009
Employees: 5

In the company’s own words:
“Firehoze provides short, targeted video lessons in math and science designed to supplement learning activities — whether you’re in or out of the classroom. A lot is covered in class. Have you ever left a lecture more confused than when you entered? Firehoze provides video tutorials from the most talented tutors around so you can quickly gain clarity on those concepts for which you require help.”

About the technology:
Firehoze offers a catalog of community-generated video tutorials designed to allow students to find help with STEM education topics. Users can preview videos to discover multiple teaching styles to find the best fit for their learning style. They can track favorite instructors to be alerted when new lessons are posted or request videos on specific topics. Firehoze also lets users join or create groups for sharing videos, working with peers and getting help from the whole Firehoze user community. Instructors can register as tutors and create instructional videos that can be hosted on the site. When users purchase the video tutorial, the instructor receives a portion of the sale revenue.

People behind the company:
Christina Chase is Firehoze’s co-founder and full-time managing partner in charge of business development, outreach and tutor/community management. Previously, she worked at the Bedford-based healthcare start-up Casenet Inc. as their senior director of marketing and business development. The other two founders have requested to stay unidentified as they both currently also work at other companies. Serving as a board member and advisor for Firehoze, Bret Siarkowski was most recently the founder and CTO of Casenet Inc. Bob Sturim, who also serves as a board member and advisor, is the vice president of engineering at Scribe Software Corp. in Bedford, N.H.

The Pitch:
Firehoze is seeking between $500,000 and $1 million in seed funding for content creation, marketing, community management and user experience enhancements. The company is also seeking partnerships with learning centers and organizations that offer tutoring services or accelerated learning activities, charter or private educational institutions, academic institutions that provide online classes or degrees, home-school organizations and textbook companies looking to build out their ability to further support their user base.

Partnerships:
Firehoze currently has collaborative partnerships with the MIT School of Engineering Office of Engineering Outreach, Colorado State University, Assumption College’s Academic Support Center and Cambridge-based interactive textbook publishing startup Worldwide Center of Math LLC.
  
The market:
The company is targeting the high school and college level STEM education market, focusing on both the students as well as instructors. According to Chase, the tutoring market the company is pursuing was estimated at between $5 billion and $7 billion in 2007, with estimated growth of more than 5 percent a year.

The competition:
According to Chase, the company’s competition includes the STEM instructional video non-profit organization Khan Academy, individual educator sites such as Dr. Math, subscription tutorial sites such as TenMarks Education Inc. and how-to video sites that have education as one of its sub-topics such as Howcast Media Inc.