Preply CEO recounts bootstrapped start to $1.2 billion edtech unicorn

Kirill Bigai and Dmytro Voloshyn founded Preply in 2012, operating out of Kyiv after a small pre-seed investment ran out within a year. To survive, they each held separate jobs—Bigai as an implementation consultant at Creatio and Voloshyn pursuing a PhD while coding for AB InBev—while spending roughly 60 hours a week on the startup and forgoing any salary. Six months after launch they began earning a modest $100 monthly, eventually reaching $500 after two years, which allowed them to quit their side jobs and devote themselves entirely to Preply.

The platform initially focused on English tutoring via Google Forms and Skype, quickly expanding to dozens of languages and later to subjects like math and chess. A 2016 seed round of $1.3 million helped scale the product, and a recent $150 million Series D led by WestCap lifted the company’s valuation to $1.2 billion, bringing total funding above $299 million. Today Preply employs about 800 staff and hosts 150,000 tutors across more than 90 languages, serving learners in 180 countries.