Babbel

Babbel GmbH, operating as Babbel, is a German subscription-based language learning software and e-learning platform, available in various languages since January 2008. Babbel is operated by Babbel GmbH in Berlin, Germany. Babbel has around 450 full-time employees and freelancers. The company is based in the Berlin neighborhood of Mitte. The company was founded in August 2007 by Thomas Holl, Toine Diepstraten, Lorenz Heine and Markus Witte. In January 2008, the language learning platform went online with community features as a free beta version. In 2008, Kizoo Technology Ventures and IBB Beteiligungsgesellschaft mbH became Babbel's first investors. Then, in 2009, Babbel was granted roughly one million euros by the ERDF European Structural Fund. The new product version, Babbel 2.0, went online in November 2009. At that time Babbel's founders decided against an advertising and mixed-finance model (freemium), opting for paid content. In March 2013, Babbel acquired San Francisco startup PlaySay Inc. to expand into the United States. As part of the acquisition, PlaySay Founder and CEO Ryan Meinzer joined Babbel as a strategic advisor for its US operations. In January 2015, Babbel opened an office in New York City with the aim of expanding its presence in the US market. Later that year, a third funding round led by Scottish Equity Partners raised another $22 million. Other participants in this round include previous investors Reed Elsevier Ventures, Nokia Growth Partners, and VC Fonds Technology Berlin. Since January 2017, Babbel, Inc., the company's US subsidiary, has been led by Julie Hansen, CEO U.S. In November 2018 the company announced it had sold around 1 million subscriptions during the previous year. It was also launching a new set of products, oriented at travel marketplace. The project was going to launch in 2019. In 2019, co-founder Markus Witte stepped down as CEO and was replaced by Arne Schepker. In March 2020, a works council was elected that represents the employees of the Berlin office.