A majority of platforms with advice on romantic relationships that are live now are targeted at couples and are usually created not for Gen Z, but for older generations like millennials. In addition, a majority of educational resources on sex education are targeted at children. While Gen Z is stepping into their sex and romantic lives, they have no reliable, trustworthy resource for seeking professional advice at a reasonable price. Eventually, Quinky is here to take up that space and become the ‘Duolingo of sex education’.
Antler’s first European sex tech round
Quinky carries the credit of being the first European sex tech startup to get funding from Antler, a Singaporean business incubator and startup accelerator by raising €100k in the first round. Notably, Antler has already backed Dutch startups Getplace.io and Equip. Currently, Quinky has a team of 9 and interns from 4 universities across the globe. Also, they are working towards hiring fresh talent.
The Amsterdam-based startup develops games and focuses on a small focus group of students who were trying out these games. They launched a test bot with games and had over 700 people testing it within the first week. To make sure the content is up to the highest standards, Quinky works with the best sexologists – like Laura Vowels, a former advisor at Blueheart, Quinky’s biggest US competitor. Each task or game is verified by a professional, unlike the content that can be found on social media or in porn.
When asked about the investment to TFN, the company said “Quinky’s CEO Mariia Plotkina had a long-lasting dream of creating a technological product for sex ed. At first, she wasn’t accepted – but Mariia is the type of person who won’t take “no” for an answer, so she kept trying. At the moment she only had an idea of what she was going to do – and then she met her cofounder, Neahme Jbaily, who had an experience of building a successful company and he immediately fell in love with the idea. Together they got accepted into the Antler cohort, got a team together and secured funding – and in January 2023 Quinky came to life.”
Revolutionises sex education for Gen Z
The idea of Quinky came to life because the company’s founder, Mariia Plotkina has a vast experience of working with high-school students. She saw that the majority of teenagers and young adults were either getting their education from porn or from social media – and none of those resources are safe. Mariia decided to make an outlet that will be fun to use, visually appealing and the information on it would be safe and inclusive.
The app believes that sex education should be accessible, fun and aesthetically pleasing. It has to be very easy to use, and bring positive emotions into the users’ lives to form a healthy habit. On Quinky, the sex tips and tricks are shared in the form of engaging games that take only a few minutes, but bring a ton of positive emotions. They aim to replace Google and PornHub in terms of where people go to look for tips for the bedroom.
The company said, “The content on Quinky is categorised with a system of tags. When onboarding onto the app, everyone will have a choice regarding which kind of tasks do people want to see. When developing games, it was important for us to cater to solo people and couples, LGBTQIA+ people, asexual people and even aromantics, so that everyone can find a game for themselves.”
Quinky is promoting safe sex via building a community and a network of partnerships with sexual wellness brands, NGOs, and universities across the globe. They are building a community on Instagram with engaging content, live streams, collaborations, useful tips and fun videos. With their Discord channel, they are giving followers an opportunity for connecting and doing things together, and have some fun ideas for passtime.
