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On World Book Day we celebrate Amol and Sonal, co-founders creating a reading revolution with ingenious app

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Celebrating World Book Day, we speak to MBA alumnus Amol Kane and his co-founder wife Sonal, who are transforming the world’s youngest citizens through reading.

On returning to India after completing his MBA from Oxford Saïd, Amol Kane, and his software developer wife, Sonal Halbe Kane, sought to address the reported decline in recreational reading among children. 

Inspired by their daughter and her friends’ reluctance to embrace the world of books, Amol, an engineer, and Sonal embarked on a journey to transform how children perceive reading books through an innovative mobile library app for three to 14-year-olds. The app allows children to find and share books with friends and has already seen more than 90,000 books shared in just a few years. And the top three  books shared; Gangsta Granny by David Walliams, Taranauts by Roopa Pai, and The Gruffalo by Julia Donaldson.

Now used in more than 40 schools in India, FLIP is transforming how children there embrace reading, and is making a positive impact on thousands by stimulating their love for books. The app also improves social and emotional learning and is an experiential framework students and teachers can use in schools. The founders now plan to release the app in the U.S. UK, and Middle Eastern markets.

 

 

 

FLIP aims to build reading communities that enable children to share and read books and engage with peers. It will not only aid in foundational literacy, but also help in their cognitive, emotional, and social development.

Amol Kane

FLIP co-founder, MBA alumnus

Amol said: ‘Flip aims to build reading communities that enable children to share and read books and engage with peers. We aim to make reading fun and empowering for children. Sonal and I believe that it will not only aid in foundational literacy, but also help in cognitive, emotional, and social development.’

The app sits on a parent or guardian’s phone, allowing a child to see and reserve a book read by a peer, and read it offline. Books at home can also be shared with peers who can request books from one another. Children spend a few minutes on the app daily, with the remaining time spent reading offline, dramatically limiting their screen time while helping them develop critical skills and a lifelong love of reading.

 

 

Children love the book app because it tells them what their friends are reading and allows them to share and review the books their friends recommend. Parents love FLIP because it is simple, secure, and encourages reading.

Sonal Kane

Co-founder, FLIP

Co-founder, Sonal, said children enjoy being a part of a community and contributing positively towards it. She said: ‘Children love the book app because it tells them what their friends are reading and allows them to share books and review the books their friends recommend. Parents love FLIP because it is simple, secure, and encourages reading.’

According to a World Book Day Impact Report 2023, reading for pleasure is the single biggest indicator of a child’s future success, weighing more than family circumstances, the educational background of their parents, or income.