After experiencing life-changing trauma at just 18, she refused to let adversity define her future. Instead, she transformed one of the most difficult chapters of her life into a mission to make quality education more accessible for South African learners. As the founder of Buddy Learning, she created BuddyAI, a WhatsApp-based AI tutor available in South African languages, helping thousands of learners access affordable academic support, regardless of their income, language or location.
1. Tell us about yourself and the inspiration behind founding Buddy Learning.
I am Tshaamano Mabuba, a 23-year-old education entrepreneur, data science graduate, and the Founder and CEO of Buddy Learning and BuddyAI. I have always believed that intelligence and potential are evenly distributed, but opportunity is not. Throughout my education, I saw how the learners who could afford private tutors, additional resources, and personalised support often had an advantage over those who were equally capable but had fewer resources.
I founded Buddy Learning to make quality academic support more accessible while also creating meaningful employment opportunities for young tutors. What began as a small tutoring initiative has grown into a team of approximately 70 tutors supporting learners through individual tutoring, school programmes and technology. The inspiration has always been simple: a learner’s future should not be determined by their parents’ income, their location, the language they speak or the school they attend.
2. How did your personal experiences shape your entrepreneurial journey?
My entrepreneurial journey was shaped as much by pain as it was by ambition. I began university full of plans for my future, but my academic journey was disrupted after I experienced assault related trauma and later became seriously ill. I experienced seizures and other health challenges and had to rebuild my life at a time when it felt as though everything I had worked towards was falling apart.
There were moments when I felt left behind while everyone else appeared to be moving forward. However, those experiences gave me a deeper understanding of how quickly a learner’s circumstances can change. Sometimes a person does not lack discipline or potential; they are simply carrying something that nobody else can see.
Building Buddy Learning became part of my healing. It allowed me to turn some of the most painful experiences of my life into something that could create hope, access, and opportunity for others. I am still learning and healing, but I no longer believe that a difficult chapter has to become the ending of your story.
3. What problem is BuddyAI solving for South African learners?
Millions of South African learners need additional academic support, but private tutoring remains unaffordable for many families. Teachers are also working incredibly hard in classrooms that may be overcrowded, making it difficult to provide every learner with individual attention. There are further barriers involving language, data costs, access to devices, and the availability of educational support outside normal school hours.
BuddyAI is a personalised, WhatsApp-based AI tutor designed to give learners affordable academic support directly through a platform they already use. Learners can ask questions, receive step-by-step explanations, practise through quizzes, submit pictures of textbook questions, and interact through text or voice notes.
The platform is being developed to support South African languages and align with the CAPS and IEB curricula. It is not intended to replace teachers. Its purpose is to extend their impact and ensure that learners can continue receiving support after the school day ends. BuddyAI currently has approximately 1,700 users across paid access and pilot programmes, while Buddy Learning’s broader programmes have reached more than 10,000 learners and families.
4. Why did you choose WhatsApp as the platform for BuddyAI?
We chose WhatsApp because innovation is only meaningful when people can actually access it. Many education technology products require learners to download another application, remember another password, use significant data, or own an expensive device. Those requirements can unintentionally exclude the very learners who need support the most.
WhatsApp is already familiar to learners, parents and teachers. It works on relatively affordable smartphones, is generally less intimidating than a new learning platform, and supports text, images and voice notes. A learner can photograph a question, send a voice note in their home language or type a message without having to learn how to navigate a complicated system.
We wanted to meet learners where they already are rather than expecting them to change their behaviour before they can receive help. For us, accessibility was not something to add after building the product; it shaped the product from the beginning.
5. What has been the most rewarding moment since launching the platform?
The most rewarding moments are often not the awards, numbers, or public recognition. They are the small moments when a learner moves from saying, “I cannot do this,” to saying, “I understand.” Seeing a learner ask a question in a language they are comfortable with and receive an explanation without feeling embarrassed is incredibly meaningful to me. Many learners are afraid to ask questions in class because they do not want to appear behind their peers. BuddyAI gives them a private space to keep trying.
It has also been rewarding to watch something that began as an idea grow into a platform being tested and used by learners from different backgrounds. Every learner interaction reminds me that behind the technology is a real child with dreams, fears, potential, and a future that matters.
6. What challenges have you faced as a young female entrepreneur?
One of the biggest challenges has been being taken seriously. As a young woman, I have sometimes walked into rooms where people assumed I was an assistant, intern, or junior team member rather than the founder. I have often felt that I needed to arrive exceptionally prepared just to be considered equally credible.
Fundraising and building in the technology sector have also taught me how important it is to understand ownership, contracts, intellectual property, and financial sustainability. Passion alone does not protect a business. There have also been personal challenges. Entrepreneurship can be lonely, and there have been times when I carried the pressure of payroll, product development, client expectations, and my own health quietly because I believed a leader always had to appear strong.
I am learning that strength is not pretending that everything is fine. Strength is being honest, asking for support, setting boundaries, and making difficult decisions even when they disappoint people.
7. How do you stay motivated during difficult times?
I return to the reason I started. When things become difficult, I remind myself that Buddy Learning is not only a company. It represents learners gaining confidence, parents receiving support, and young people earning an income through tutoring.
I also allow myself to be human. I used to believe motivation meant waking up inspired every day. I now understand that some days require discipline, while other days require rest. There are days when I am confident and days when I question everything.
I stay grounded by speaking to people I trust, celebrating little progress, and separating a difficult day from a failed life. I have survived moments that once felt impossible, so I remind myself that uncertainty does not automatically mean the end. Most importantly, I try not to build from fear. I want the company to grow, but I also want to remain healthy, present, and connected to the purpose behind the work.
8. What advice would you give to young women who want to start a business?
Start with the problem, not the logo. Speak to the people you hope to serve, test the smallest version of your idea, and learn whether somebody is genuinely willing to use or pay for it. You do not need to appear perfect before you begin.
Learn the financial side of your business early. Understand your costs, margins, contracts, taxes, ownership and cash flow. Do not give away equity simply because somebody has shown interest, and do not confuse encouragement with commitment. Choose your partners carefully. Shared excitement is not the same as shared values, discipline or accountability.
I would also tell young women not to attach their entire identity to the success of the business. A rejected proposal does not mean you are a failure. You can be disappointed, regroup, and continue. Finally, do not shrink your ambition to make other people comfortable. Build boldly, but remain teachable.
9. What role do you believe technology can play in improving education in South Africa?
Technology has the potential to make education more personalised, accessible and responsive, but it must be designed around South Africa’s realities. It can help learners receive immediate explanations, practise at their own pace and access support beyond school hours. It can also help teachers identify common learning gaps, create assessments and reduce some of their administrative burden.
However, technology is not automatically inclusive. A solution that requires expensive devices, constant connectivity or English-only interaction can deepen inequality instead of reducing it. The most valuable education technology will be affordable, multilingual, curriculum-aligned, safe and simple to use. It should strengthen teachers rather than position itself as their replacement.
We also need to approach artificial intelligence responsibly. Learner privacy, age-appropriate content, accuracy, safeguarding and human oversight must be taken seriously. Technology should never become an excuse to remove care, context and human connection from education.
10. What has been your biggest lesson in leadership so far?
My biggest lesson has been that leadership is not doing everything yourself. In the beginning, I believed that being a committed founder meant carrying every responsibility personally. Over time, that created exhaustion, bottlenecks, and frustration for both me and the team.
Leadership requires clear expectations, systems, accountability, and honest conversations. Caring about people does not mean avoiding difficult feedback, and holding high standards does not mean leading without empathy. Both can exist together. I have also learnt that people cannot read my mind. A leader must communicate the vision repeatedly, define what success looks like and create an environment in which team members can take ownership.
I am still learning to delegate, to trust and to accept that I will not always make the perfect decision. Leadership is not about appearing certain at all times. It is about remaining responsible, reflective and willing to correct your course.
11. What’s next for Buddy Learning and BuddyAI?
Our immediate priority is to continue improving the quality, reliability and accessibility of BuddyAI. We are strengthening its multilingual capabilities, learner onboarding, curriculum alignment, voice-note support, image-based questions, safety systems and personalised learning experience. We are also working with education and learning-science experts to ensure the platform supports genuine conceptual understanding rather than simply giving learners answers.
We plan to expand our partnerships with schools, companies, foundations and organisations that want to provide affordable academic support to learners at scale. We are also developing tools that can help teachers integrate BuddyAI into their classrooms and monitor learner engagement more effectively.
Our long-term vision is to make personalised learning support available to every learner, regardless of income, language or location. We want BuddyAI to become a trusted tutor in every learner’s pocket, beginning in South Africa and eventually expanding into other African markets.
12. What does being a woman in business mean to you?
Being a woman in business means having the freedom to build, lead and make decisions without needing to become a different version of myself. For a long time, women were told that leadership required them to be less emotional, less soft or less feminine. I believe empathy, intuition, vulnerability and care can be leadership strengths when combined with courage, competence and accountability.
Being a woman in business also comes with responsibility. Every room I enter was made possible by women who challenged expectations before me. I want my journey to make the next woman’s path slightly easier. It means creating opportunities, paying women fairly, sharing knowledge and refusing to treat another woman’s success as a threat.
I do not want to be celebrated simply because I am a young woman building a company. I want the work to be excellent. At the same time, I recognise that representation matters. A young girl should be able to see women building technology companies and believe that space also belongs to her.
Short bio
Tshaamano Mabuba is a 23-year-old South African education entrepreneur, data science graduate, and the Founder and CEO of Buddy Learning and BuddyAI. Through Buddy Learning, she leads a growing network of approximately 70 tutors providing academic support to learners, while BuddyAI delivers personalised, curriculum-aligned tutoring through WhatsApp.
Her work focuses on making education more affordable, multilingual and accessible to learners regardless of income, location or background. Tshaamano’s entrepreneurial journey was shaped by her own experiences of trauma, illness and rebuilding, inspiring her commitment to using education and technology to create opportunity for others.
Contact information
Name: Tshaamano Mabuba
Position: Founder & CEO, Buddy Learning and BuddyAI
Email: tshaamano@buddylearning.co.za
Website: www.buddylearning.co.za
Social media links
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tshaamanomabuba/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/buddylearning_/
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@buddylearning_?lang=en
