German education technology startup paddy has raised €1 million in pre-seed funding to expand its artificial intelligence platform designed for classroom teachers. The Bielefeld-based company, operating under DigitalErleben GmbH, secured the investment round with High-Tech Gründerfonds serving as lead investor.
The funding comes just six months after paddy launched its AI-powered teaching assistant in January 2025. The platform has already attracted 12,000 active teacher users across the German-speaking region, demonstrating early market traction for automated lesson planning tools.
Young Founders Target Teacher Burnout
Three 22-year-old founders established paddy after witnessing teacher stress firsthand. Matty Frommann, Lukas Portmann, and Tobias Schröder – all children of educators – later brought on Lukas Kaufmann as chief technology officer to complete the founding team.
“As a student, I witnessed firsthand how much pressure many of our teachers were under—with hardly any time for individual support, even though they had the will. That’s exactly where the idea for paddy came from” ~ Matty Frommann, co-founder & CEO of paddy.
The founders experienced teacher frustration at breakfast table conversations about overcrowded classrooms and administrative burdens that prevented individualized student attention. During the pandemic, they organized teacher training sessions and observed schools struggling with digital infrastructure gaps.
AI Automates Lesson Preparation Tasks
The paddy platform handles repetitive teaching preparation work by identifying lesson topics, target audiences, and learning objectives automatically. The system generates differentiated content, suggests teaching methods, and analyzes student learning levels to recommend next steps for instruction.
Teachers can access the platform without additional training requirements. The AI creates tailored materials in multiple formats while providing digital implementation tools for classroom use. Progress tracking features help educators identify struggling students quickly.
Felix Assion, investment manager at High-Tech Gründerfonds, praised both the product and founding team “paddy shows how to reduce stress for teachers while simultaneously training students in the use of AI at an early stage” Assion noted, highlighting the founders’ entrepreneurial abilities despite their young age.
Addressing Market Demand
The German-speaking education market represents significant opportunity, with approximately two million teachers working across more than 40,000 schools in the DACH region, according to German Employment Agency data. Research from technology industry association Bitkom indicates that over 70 percent of teachers identify overwork and staffing shortages as primary challenges.
More than half of surveyed educators report that increasing class sizes limit their ability to provide individualized student support. The paddy platform aims to free up time for personalized teaching by automating administrative and preparation tasks.
The company projects mid-six-figure revenue by year-end as adoption grows among German-speaking educators. The funding will support platform development and market expansion efforts across the region.
From Classroom Observation to Commercial Launch
The paddy concept emerged from direct classroom exposure rather than traditional market research. The founders established DigitalErleben GmbH in 2024 before launching their AI platform the following January.
The solution consolidates multiple teaching tools into a single interface, eliminating the need for educators to navigate between various applications and file systems. This streamlined approach allows teachers to focus on student interaction and feedback rather than lesson logistics.
With established user base growth and institutional investor backing, paddy positions itself to scale across German-speaking educational institutions. The company’s approach combines founder market knowledge with artificial intelligence automation to address documented teacher workload issues.