CureAble’s ₹2 Crore Investment Fuels Hope for Neurodiverse Children Across India

Raising special needs children or slow learners comes with unique challenges, but many parents in India are unaware of, or choose to ignore, the root causes behind their child’s struggles. Whether it’s learning disorders, ADHD, autism, Down syndrome, or cerebral palsy, these conditions demand specialized attention and care. Sadly, a lack of awareness, stigma, and limited resources often leave such children without the personalized support they need to thrive.

Mainstream education systems often fall short in addressing these issues, and daycares or general programs don’t provide the focused nurturing that these kids require. While government initiatives, NGOs, and health centers have started bringing the conversation to the forefront, there’s still a long way to go in ensuring meaningful support for families navigating these challenges.

That’s where CureAble comes in. This innovative platform provides expert therapist-planned, personalized care for special-needs children and slow learners in the comfort of their homes. Special needs include, but are not limited to, ADHD, Autism, Cerebral Palsy, Down Syndrome, Intellectual Disability, Language and Speech Disorders, Learning Disorders, etc.

They have recently raised ₹2 Crore in pre-seed funding too, from a US-based investment firm Brahma Tank.

Their RCI (Rehabilitation Council of India) certified and trained Special Educator nurtures the special child at their home, following a comprehensive and personalized 12-week-long daily planner created by an expert therapist. These result in assured overall growth for the child. With bi-weekly progress tracking and progress report sharing, they claim to ensure 100% transparency regarding the child’s progress and development.

Their vision is to become the World’s largest special-needs care platform, impacting 100M special-needs kids globally in the next 10 years.

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We sat down with the Co-founder and CTO – Arbob Mehmood, for an one on one interview, in helping us understand their startup better, and learn about their goals and vision. Do go through their interview conducted by Desi Founder Team.

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What inspired you to create CureAble, and how did you identify the need for personalized, at-home therapy for special kids?

One of Krish’s (Co-founder @ CureAble) relatives had a special-needs child, and due to the issues in hindsight outlined below, it eventually led to their divorce. This made us think: Why should the child suffer? What could have been done to mitigate this? After talking with 300+ parents, therapists, doctors and special educators, we identified major issues in the special-needs sector:

• 9 out of 10 schools in India are not receptive & ill-equipped to cater to special-needs kids
• Kids lack improvement due to unplanned and non-personalized care
• Lack of holistic approach to therapy results in significant delay in kid’s growth in their most valuable years
• In India, 1 in 8 children have a neurodiverse condition and up to 80% don’t get the care they need.
• Lack of transparent and consistent care and support at therapy centers
• Globally, around 1% of the worlds’ children are autistic and more than 10% have behavioural developmental issues.

So, we decided to build CureAble to provide personalized care for special-needs kids.

Could you share a memorable moment or story from the early days of CureAble’s journey?

One of our first parents had an ADHD kid of 18 years of age. Since, greater the age, more difficult it is for therapies to help the kid improve their condition. The parents had a granite shop, and being a single kid they wanted their son to take care of the business after his father retires. It was a very difficult time for the parents, considering the complex situation. But, with our personalized plan and trackable approach to growth at cureAble, we worked on the kid with consistent therapies and now he is successfully handling the shop alongside his father. It was a big achievement for us.

Why did you decide to focus on home-based care instead of traditional therapy centers?

Initially, due to low cost of operations and specific niche of working parents wanting a home based solution, we started with this approach. However, we are also planning to open therapy centers across India, soon.

How do you design personalized therapy plans, especially for diverse conditions like ADHD, Autism, Down Syndrome, etc.?

We have created a proprietary framework for each condition. After a detailed consultation with the parents, our counseling team and therapy team use that framework to build a comprehensive planner.

What factors do you consider when creating the 12-week goal-oriented planners for each child?

Factors including Activities of Daily Living, Brain Gym, Academics, Fine Motor, Gross Motor, Sensory, Behaviour, among others are considered to create a holistic plan for all round development of the kid.

How do you ensure that therapy plans adapt to a child’s progress over time?

With bi-weekly progress reports, weekly feedback calls and regular assessment reviews, enabled us to continuously update the plan for the kid as they grow.

What is your process for selecting and training RCI-certified special educators?

We have a 4 stage process to identify, select and train the special educators. We have a thorough interview process and we have a 3-months training module, which enables the special-educator to provide best possible therapies to the kids.

How do you match therapists with families to ensure compatibility and comfort?

We discuss with the parent beforehand regarding their choice of therapies M/F. We have a database of therapists with expertise in different conditions. We select the best possible therapist with the database we have created internally according to their experience, conditions, location etc.

What ongoing training or support do you provide to your educators?

We have weekly reviews for each special-educator on the ongoing therapies as well as new trends, approach, equipment to enhance their skills consistently.

Given the sensitivity of the data, how does CureAble ensure user privacy and data protection?

The data is secured within our private cloud with specialized access to different teams like Planner team, Consultancy team, Core team, etc.

Can you explain how bi-weekly progress reports maintain transparency and build trust with parents?

We have built a daily report framework where therapists note down the things done, which we verify with the parents during our weekly call. Then our reports team build the report which mentions the activities done each day, improvements, score and growth over time, so that parents can know what is happening with their kid at a certain point of time.

What specific benefits have you seen for children receiving therapy at home versus in a clinical setting?

Both have their pros and cons. Biggest pro for a home-based setting is the kid is comfortable within the surroundings, so he/she can improve at a much faster rate with consistent growth. Parents also don’t have to waste precious time to travel to the therapy centers for a 45 min session.

How do you support parents and caregivers throughout the therapy process?

We have a weekly feedback call with both of them, regarding their needs, suggestions, feedback so that they can be in sync with the therapies being done.

Do you collaborate with institutions, schools, or government organizations? If so, how do these partnerships benefit your users?

We have partnered with big name institutions across NCR for placement support. We are also planning on partnering with the government. institutions to provide therapies to underprivileged children.

How does CureAble engage with the broader community to raise awareness about special-needs education?

We regularly do awareness campaigns, game shows, events etc. across societies in NCR for awareness. We are also very active on social-media, giving self-paced therapy suggestions to the parents.

Are there plans to expand your services to other cities or even internationally?

Yes. After we cover NCR, we’re planning to move to nearby cities/states like Chandigarh, Meerut, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Chhattisgarh, MP. We are planning to go international within the next 2-3 years.

How do you envision the future of CureAble, especially with advancements in personalized education technology?

We are planning to impact 100M special kids within the next 10 years within Home-based, therapy center based as well as school-based, tech-based (VR, App-based) therapies.

What advice would you give to aspiring entrepreneurs who want to make a difference in the special-needs space?

I think compassion is very much needed in this field. Whether you are working with kids or not, compassion and patience is a must have to succeed in any kind of business.

What have been the biggest challenges, and how did you overcome them?

Hiring has been the biggest challenge. To find and train good therapists, but we have improved significantly in that front in the last 1.5 yrs.

What qualities do you think are essential for success in the healthcare and education sectors?

Compassion, Patience and humility + Passion and vision to impact the lives of kids across the world.

What’s the most rewarding part of running CureAble, and how has this experience shaped your perspective on Special Needs Kids?

Seeing the improvement in the lives of kids and parents, the kind of feedback they give us, things their kids can do now which would be very difficult in the initial phases of therapies, make us proud at cureAble and gives us confidence to help more and more kids in their developmental journey.

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