A Northern Kentucky startup that’s fighting plagiarism in higher education has joined an international incubator program known for its global reach in the edtech space.
Sikanai, based in Park Hills, Kentucky, has joined the SuperCharger Ventures “Incubator 2.0” cohort. The 24-week program, which is geared for pre-seed to seed companies, will culminate later this year with a pitch competition to interested investors.
Sikanai is among 20 startups worldwide selected to participate, co-founder Barry Burkett told me. He said the program will help refine the company’s flagship product, Auth+, a new software tool in the fight against ghostwriting in education.
Burkett said Sikanai applied in hopes to tap into SuperCharger’s support network. SuperCharger, an edtech accelerator and incubator based in London and Hong Kong, has a total of 96 startup alumni, which have raised more than $550 million.
Past and present partners include Microsoft, AWS and Imperial College Business School, among others.
“We wanted to work with organizations that are in our space and understand our needs,” he said.
Burkett and Wasi Khan founded Sikanai in last March. Burkett is an instructional designer and worked in the Office of eCampus Learning at Eastern Kentucky University. Khan is a former ghostwriter, living in Karachi, Pakistan.
The two met in 2014 in an instructional design forum. Burkett was doing research on how to prevent ghostwriting, or contract cheating, in online classrooms. Khan had developed a tool he felt could be used to stop it. Khan continued to rework and refine that idea into what is now Auth+.
Auth+ works by using AI to cross-question students on their submitted work — to ensure that it is their own — and gives a report to the instructor.
Burkett said the use of ghostwriting in classrooms is exploding. Some students outsource their coursework, and it often passes plagiarism detection software programs since it’s a unique writing. The work is sourced from other students on campus, online tutoring services or from gig workers, he said.
Sikanai has primarily focused marketing efforts on post-secondary institutions, but Burkett has been approached by high school instructors asking to use the tool as well.
The company is looking for funding to bring on personnel (SuperCharger doesn’t give capital but takes 5% equity in the companies in the incubator). He and Khan are currently the only full-time employees.
The incubator program, which will run fully remote, includes weekly sprints, education panels, mentorship and more. SuperCharger's Yiran Qin said SuperCharger received more than 300 applications from 56 countries for the incubator and accelerator program.
