Speak doubles down on Korea as launchpad for AI-powered English learning

Korea has become the centerpiece of Speak's global growth strategy, as learners here have few chances to practice speaking despite their high level of exam-focused grammar and reading skills, the firm's chief operating officer said.

He described the country as its most strategically important market and a proving ground for products that are now expanding globally.

"Korea is and will always be a key market for us," Colton Gyulay, chief operating officer at Speak, said in a recent interview, noting that the company chose Korea as its first market when it launched in 2019.

According to Gyulay, Korea's English education environment made it an ideal place to develop Speak's conversational artificial intelligence (AI) platform.

While Korean learners typically acquire strong grammar and reading skills through years of exam-oriented education, they have relatively few opportunities to practice speaking.

That gap, combined with high motivation to improve English proficiency and rapid adoption of new technologies, helped shape Speak's early growth, he said.

Gyulay said Japan shares a similarly tes ...