Norland; Improving learning through games

Gerdali, who came from another planet to Noroland, in order to be able to play in the fun worlds of animal care, dentistry, painting, driving a car, etc., must reach the destination of the game planet, but his ship’s fuel for this long journey , Not enough; So, it is necessary that this lovely blue creature, with a variety of cognitive and learning skill exercises for a few seconds, ease his mind about the tank.

This is the scenario of the mobile game Noroland, which with patience, hard work and positive thinking of its members, started from the lawns of the University of Tehran, passed all kinds of tables in the book garden and continues its colorful journey, with the hope that it will be able to May all the good children of Iran be useful.

Please allow us to get to know your team.

My wife – Alireza Pir – always had an entrepreneurial spirit; I also accompanied him on this path and together we entered the entrepreneurial ecosystem. We started our cooperation from the undergraduate days of computer science at Gilan University, working in the center of creativity and prosperity of the university and designing the game “Ta Be Ta” which is still available in Cafe Bazar.

“Ta Be Ta” became the top idea of ​​Gilan province that year and was also supported by Gilan Science and Technology Park, and we were able to register our company called Amolai (which is a Gilaki word meaning butterfly), but from there that we had not thought much about income generation and financial plan, despite the large number of users of this game, we did not have significant financial income.

In these years, we also had various other experiences, such as “Thikado” – the production of 3D postcards – which we abandoned because the team was not consistent and also, our focus was more on technical issues and we were not familiar enough with the mechanism of paper.

But we have been working on the idea of ​​Noroland for two and a half years. Alireza and I formed the initial idea. Alireza Pir is the project manager and I, Leila Keshavarz Afshar, are responsible for scientific research and marketing. Amir Hossein Qanafsand, technical manager, Alireza Ranjbar Shorabi, a gamification expert, Hossein Nirini, a content production expert, Amir Hossein Darodian, a Unity game developer, Elham Islami, a graphic designer, Farid Safdari, a marketing consultant, and Irfan Habibi were gradually added to our team as leaders. Dr. Saynaz Maudet and Dr. Akram Parand are experts and consultants in our children’s field.

What is Noroland?

Norlandthe mobile game is to strengthen the cognitive skills of pre-school children, which aims to improve the child’s attention, memory, reading, writing and math skills.

Who is the target community of Noroland?

In the early stages of development, we focused on children with learning disabilities, but with the advice of team psychologists and based on the type of games designed, we realized that cognitive skills can be improved at any age – from children to adults. Therefore, we focus on strengthening skills that are useful for all children.

What made you decide to launch it?

In the early years of Amolai’s establishment, we made games for institutions and centers related to children. In some of these projects (which were often commissioned by experts and child psychologists), physical or pen and paper games were transformed into digital games.

They were concerned that in this age when children have a good relationship with mobile games, it is possible to have a more effective treatment by using these types of games. Also, some psychologists were concerned that the results of the home pen-and-paper games were not the result of the child’s own practice and the parents had a hand in it, but if it is a mobile game that the child played and the result was sent to us. , this problem will be solved to some extent.

So finally, after years of effort and experience in this field, Noroland was born.

Is it necessary to study psychology to start such a startup?

Yes, it is necessary to have at least one person with this expertise because we are dealing with a specific area. Also, an expert must be present so that the classification of the games is done in principle and their effectiveness is confirmed. In Noroland, Dr. Modet and Parand are the shareholders of the team and have been with us in this department since the beginning of its formation.

How long did it take you to get to the initial version of the app?

After 4 months, MVP was made, but what was made two years ago is completely different from the current version of Noroland. We have been continuously testing the MVP and getting feedback from consultants and optimizing it and this cycle is still going on.

Has Norland passed human trials?

With the help of the psychologists of the team, we had human experiments at each stage of the test-optimization cycle, but it was necessary to publish an article in order to confirm the validity of our work. Is.

In addition, students of related fields have also worked on Noroland, and even the thesis topic of one of the cognitive science students at Farhangian University is a study on the impact of Noroland.

Please tell us about the story of Amirkabir’s acceptance and activity in the Samsung Accelerator.

February-March 2017, the idea of ​​Noroland was formed, and at the beginning, we used any space as a workplace to grow Noroland; From Tehran University to Bagh Kitab, every day from 9 am to 7-8 pm!

At that time, we didn’t see the idea as ripe enough to present the plan to accelerators and VCs, until in September 2018, the plan had reached such maturity that it could be presented. We presented it to three-four accelerators, and our design was selected in all of them. After consideration and consideration, we decided to settle in Amirkabir Samsung Technology Center and after about two years, we believe that it was a very right choice.

With its unwavering support, this center helped Noroland grow in every way, and Noroland made significant progress in the year and a half that it was in Samsung.

It’s been a few days since our support period at Samsung has ended and now we are based at the Mana Innovation Center at the University of Science and Technology.

How many people have used your service and how many active users do you have?

Since the beginning of Noroland’s release to the market, we have not had any advertisement or marketing plan to transfer the huge flow of users to Noroland, because we were always soft launching and fixing bugs so that the version is optimized and ready to attract more users.

Nevertheless, we have had 2,500 users since the beginning, and about 400 of them are active users.

What measures have you taken to deal with the challenge of mobile game addiction in children?

From the beginning, it was also our concern that Noroland would not be a factor for the child’s dependence on the mobile phone, so to solve this concern, we decided to provide the possibility for parents to limit the playing time of their child on the Noroland parent page. Set in the day.

If these restrictions are fulfilled, the atmosphere of Noroland will become night and the character of Noroland will fall asleep, and the message will be sent to the child that “Gardali is tired and wants to sleep.” To continue the game, you must go and rest”!

Did you need a license from the Ministry of Health to put Noroland on the market?

No, but we have obtained the license of Computer Games Foundation. Also, thanks to Noroland, we have become a creative knowledge-based company that has made the process of obtaining licenses easier. We are currently in the process of applying for an education license because we envision the use of Noroland in schools and children’s homes.

What were the most important challenges you faced?

Apart from the general challenges that all startups face, such as providing personal capital and spending a lot of time, proving the authenticity and efficiency of Noroland was one of our most important challenges. In order to conduct pilot studies in the larger community and publish the article, we entered schools in District 6 of Tehran to test Noroland on communities of 40-50 children between 6-7 years old, which is difficult to test on a large number of children.

Another issue was bringing psychologists with us. Although many well-educated psychologists in Iran have accompanied us on this path, some loved ones in this field did not understand the importance of computer games and its positive effects on children.

From the very beginning, we signed a cooperation agreement with several famous psychology clinics in Iran, and they, in addition to providing us with samples for testing, also supported the scientific aspect of Noroland and continue to do so.

In the technical department, we faced the challenge of how to make a reinforcement game attractive and enjoyable for children. Although our customers were families and we had to show its scientific validity to families, on the other hand, our main users were children. Therefore, the game environment should first of all be lovely for these audiences; As a result, it was necessary to establish a balance between science and attractiveness of Noroland.

How did the corona pandemic affect your business?

In some ways, it was positive and now families accept mobile games more easily and use mobile phones to educate children. At the same time, remote work was difficult for us, who are interested in the shared workspace and find it very useful to connect with other teams and exchange experience in this dynamic environment.

Although after about a month and testing the software and various project management tools, we passed this challenge well.

Are there any businesses similar to Noroland?

There are both foreign and domestic examples of games that strengthen skills, but some of these games strengthen cognitive skills in an unprincipled way, or the categories in the game are not very clear; That is, we do not know exactly what skills are targeted to be strengthened, and no article has been published about their function.

Of course, some samples are working well. For example, a very successful example of similar games, which of course has a different audience, is Loma City.

What is your competitive advantage?

One of our most important competitive advantages is that the process of testing and confirming the effectiveness of Noroland, which took about two years, has been successfully completed, and now articles have been published confirming the effectiveness of the Noroland game.

We also have speech and writing in Farsi, which the child can type with his finger on the mobile screen or read something aloud (that is, he reads and learns during the game) and the system recognizes with the help of artificial intelligence. Whether this is done correctly or not!

In addition, the difficulty level of each game in Noroland is adjusted based on the ability and performance of each child (automatic difficulty adjustment system) to maintain the necessary and sufficient challenge for that child while playing the game.

Also, a complete report is provided to the family to be aware of their child’s strength, weakness and progress during the game.

How does Noroland make money?

At the beginning of Noroland installation, a number of games can be used for free, but for full access to the games available in Noroland as well as the detailed performance report page, we suggest families to buy a long-term subscription to enjoy all the skills of skill games. use cognitive

Have you managed to attract capital yet?

A few months ago, we managed to attract 200 million capital through 100 startups and now we are trying to attract capital for our next round.

What vision do you have for the production and commercialization of Noroland?

We believe that Noroland can become a reference for all preschool children to use to improve their skills.

The last word?

It has been a few days since the new version of Noroland was released and in this short time, it has attracted a significant number of users.

We hope that good things will happen and we will get closer and closer to our vision every day.