Thinkerbell Labs is a tech-driven organization dedicated to making education more inclusive through innovative and accessible solutions. Their flagship innovation, Annie, is the world’s first Braille literacy device that allows visually impaired people to learn to read, write, and type in Braille independently and in any medium of instruction. This is a crucial innovation as there is a low rate of Braille literacy among the visually impaired, and Annie is designed to be used directly by children and young people with visual impairment to learn Braille on their own while being monitored by teachers or parents through a web application. The tactile hardware modules, tailored to teach, and a soft human voice that guides students through the lessons, eliminate the need for constant supervision and hand-holding.

Thinkerbell Labs began as an independent research project at BITS Pilani Goa Campus, where co-founders Sanskriti Dawle and Aman Srivastava built a Braille alphabet song box on a Raspberry Pi. The device received an overwhelmingly positive response from visually impaired students and their teachers, inspiring the team to learn Braille themselves in Hyderabad and to develop Annie, taking into consideration the current teaching practices and the pain points of the teacher and student pool.

In 2016, Thinkerbell Labs was officially registered as an organization and was incubated by Masschallenge UK, where they had the opportunity to present to the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, who learned how to type “George” in Braille using Annie.

The impact of Thinkerbell Labs’s work cannot be overstated. By providing a tool that enables individuals to learn Braille in a self-directed and engaging way, Thinkerbell Labs is helping to bridge this gap and open up a world of possibilities for the visually impaired.

@thinkerbell_labs

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