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Hey listeners, Imagine walking into a classroom where there are no traditional teachers – just tablets, robots, and human instructors guiding every lesson.

That future isn’t hypothetical. It’s already here.

Today’s guest on the podcast is Joleen Liang, co-founder of Squirrel AI, an education startup from China that’s already teaching thousands of students without any form of traditional teachers present. With over 20 billion data points informing its system, the company is pushing the boundaries of personalized learning. They’re building toward a future with teacher robots, preparing for a public listing, and already generating hundreds of millions in revenue.

Watch or listen now on… YouTube, Apple Podcasts, and Spotify

Takeaways from this episode

* The Autonomous Engine: Joleen explains why Squirrel AI isn’t just a chatbot, but a “virtual super-teacher” capable of handling 100% of knowledge transfer, moving toward a future of fully self-directed, teacher-less instruction.

* The “LAM vs. LLM” Edge: Why generic AI models are insufficient for education; Joleen breaks down their proprietary Learning Analysis Model (LAM) that analyzes 20 billion data points to diagnose why a student is stuck rather than just giving them the answer.

* The “Double Reduction” Resurrection: A raw look at the 2021 Chinese regulatory shift that sent revenue to zero overnight from hundreds of millions of dollars, and how Squirrel AI pivoted from software-only to a hardware-integrated “Smart Tablet” powerhouse to survive.

* The “Data Analyst” Instructor: How the role of the teacher is being permanently re-coded – shifting from a lecturer to a “psychologist and data scientist” who only intervenes when the AI triggers an alarm on a student’s frustration levels.

* The “Equity for Debt” Gambit: The incredible story of how 80% of their franchisees, facing a total market collapse, chose to convert their debt into company stock because they believed in the AI’s results more than the immediate cash.

* The “Multimodal” Mirror: A deep dive into the use of eye-gazing, facial expression tracking, and “mistake reasoning” to create a learning profile so specific it can predict a student’s mastery better than a human tutor ever could.

* The “Modern Discipline” Divide: Joleen discusses the cultural friction of expanding into the US, comparing the disciplined learning habits of Asian markets with the need for high-engagement, hyper-interesting content to keep Western students focused.

In this episode, we cover:

(0:00) AI is replacing school teachers(1:45) Why is edTech having its moment?(4:20) What do parents actually think about AI?(7:00) Do we REALLY need to spend 20+ years in school today?(9:50) How do students actually use AI inside the classroom?(12:45) Can Squirrel be globally adopted outside of China?(20:00) How China tracked students’ performance(25:45) The terrifying moment in 2021(35:30) How to disagree with your team(39:50) Why IPO vs. private?(41:20) Where to expand next?(42:15) Our next five years(45:00) One lesson you teach other founders

Thanks for listening, see you in the next episode 👋

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