Meet Chatterbox, the UK platform connecting refugees with rising opportunities in digital economy

The London-based language-learning platform has now raised over £1.5 million funding to tap the huge pool of talent of refugees in Europe
Meet Chatterbox, the UK platform connecting refugees with rising opportunities in digital economy

Following the successive conflicts in Syria, Afghanistan and now more recently, Ukraine, there has been a dramatic rise of professionals from marginalised groups in Europe. Add on to this, the statistics from the U.K. government says advertised tech vacancies have more than doubled since 2020 - hitting a record 160,887 in recent months.

As tech firms struggle with The Great Resignation and the ‘war for talent’, a London-based startup is planning to tap the estimated 40 million degree-educated professionals currently living across OECD countries who are either long-term unemployed or underemployed. Online language-learning platform Chatterbox has now raised over £1.5 million funding. The pre-seed round was led by GMG Ventures with participation from Phil Libin’s All Turtles.

The fresh capital will drive the startup's expansion of its services to tap the huge wealth of talent in refugee and marginalised communities.

Founded in 2016 by Afghani refugee Mursal Hedayat MBE and Y Combinator alumna Guillemette Dejean, the refugee-powered AI-driven online language learning platform will now attempt to connect refugees impacted by war, famine and even climate change.

Mursal Hedayat, founder and CEO of Chatterbox, said: “As we’re seeing from the Ukrainian crisis, unfortunately, we live in a world where mass displacement of talented people from war, famine and climate change is becoming increasingly common. This funding will help us further our mission of helping businesses engage with this pool of marginalised talent, especially as the pandemic accelerates the shift towards globally distributed and remote-first firms.”

The startup's trained professionals are working with Unilever, FTI Consulting and the British Red Cross.

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