By Richard Schreiber, CO-Founder NYC Autism Community Group, Autism Innovation Community
Foundation
Key2enable is an American assistive EdTech startup conceptualized in Brazil, with a market presence in
the UK, Chile, Portugal, Armenia, and the UAE. Their technology empowers children with disabilities,
their parents, healthcare professionals, teachers of Special Education, schools, and rehabilitation centers
by providing innovative Assistive Technology (AT) together with a unique inclusive educational platform
to develop their skills and individualities to use computers and mobile devices to communicate
efficiently, learn, game, work and ultimately live with greater autonomy and be economically self-
sustained in the future.
Based on assistive projects first developed in Brazil back in 2015, Key2Enable has been founded with the
goal of using exponential technologies to give autonomy and plenty of possibilities to people with motor
and intellectual disabilities all around the world.
Key2Enable states that children with disabilities are one of the most marginalized groups in society,
facing daily discrimination that bars them from enjoying their rights and participating on an equal basis
with the rest of society. Lack of literacy, numeracy, and cognitive development, combined with a lack of
motor skills, impact the future of children with disabilities, as they face multiple forms of discrimination
which leads to their exclusion from society, education, and present and future opportunities.
Key2Enable caters to people of determination, who are unable to use computers and mobile devices
due to motion limitations or lack of fine motor coordination, or who are non-verbal, by providing
innovative tools, such as the Key-X keyboard for accessing computers, learning and communicating.
Key2Enable says, generally AT is not designed for classrooms and inclusive education, rather, on an
individual level to solve accessibility issues at a micro-angle. Sadly, most schools are not truly integrated
according to Key2Enable. Special needs children are typically isolated in a classroom setting.
Further, Assisted Technology can be exceedingly expensive, in the tens of thousands of dollars per child,
making it difficult for most schools let alone families to afford. With 240 million children worldwide with
disabilities, most are just not receiving cost-effective support. Key2Enable is about to disrupt that with
affordable, inclusive, and multi-user products designed to include both neurodivergent and neurotypical
students, using the products side by side and in collaboration.
The company has been active since 2009, and has a subsidiary in the US, founded last year. Its flagship is
a keyboard, the Key-X, with 11 big, colorful buttons, with a distance from each other and sensitive to the
touch. The sequence in which these buttons are pressed is equivalent to pressing a key on a regular
keyboard, which enables people with disabilities to communicate more efficiently, without accidentally
touching the keys. For those who can only move their eyes, communication is made possible by the
connection between the keyboard and a blink detector, Colibiri, which can be attached to any pair of
glasses.
Key2Enable also offers its special education capabilities as a service via a subscription that comes with a
companion eLearning platform called Expressia, that gamifies and customizes learning. Key2Enable’s
model is proven, affordable, and tried and tested in hundreds of schools worldwide.
“Our revenue comes from direct sales plus monthly subscription plans after we first understand the
user’s needs,” said Jose Rubinger Filho, the company’s founder.
Expressia came from a need to close a huge gap in special needs learning Key2Enable knew it had to
close to be effective teaching special needs children.
“We created Expressia when we saw the difficulties special educators were having trying to engage
special needs kids with the current curriculum. Expressia can create its own sound, video, and tasks
using characters kids could relate to,” says Rubinger. Key2Enable’s impact is especially felt with younger
special needs kids who often start Kindergarten with little or no hours of literacy due to their challenges.
The typical neurotypical kid has 300 hours of literacy by age 5. Key2Enable can neutralize that gap in a
year with just two hours per day using its solutions which is absolutely game-changing.
“There is no other product in the marketplace today that can offer this,” says Rubinger.
Key2Enable solutions offer Autonomy, learning, and motion.
- The Key-X Smart Keyboard gives you the ability to write and navigate any computer.
- Simplix software offers audiovisual activities for students and patients of any cognitive level.
- TelepatiX app for Android helps paralyzed individuals write and vocalize sentences.
- a-blinX switch lets you do it all with the blink of an eye.
Key2Enable has won numerous startup awards and grants in the past decade including most recently, in
2023, Zero Project award winner for its Key X keyboard. In addition, they are recognized by the United
Nations for their products and also won an award, the Haiku Prize in Beijing China. In 2019 Key2Enable
won Best Innovation prize at the StartOut Brasil festival held in Toronto Canada.
At Entrepreneurship World Cup in 2020 in Riyadh Key 2 Enable was awarded best growth category. The
company continues to pile up awards as it seeks grants and funding and opportunities to make its
products available around the world.
Beginning its operations in the USA with the Key-X Multi-purpose Smart Keyboard, the startup has
already accomplished a remarkable achievement: in 2018, Key2Enable became a portfolio company
of Singularity University, the world’s leading school of innovation and entrepreneurship.
Key2Enable are considered capable of impacting 1 billion people in the next 10 years with our suite of
disrupting solutions and applications designed for people with disabilities.
Key2Enable now is gearing up with strategic partners to deploy its solutions at schools around the world,
integrating its award-winning technology and devices with engaging learning content for special needs
kids of all ages. Their goal is to equalize the skill and reading and comprehension gaps in special needs
children so that they are on par with neurotypical children. Plans to incorporate virtual reality and other
media are in the mix as well.
The company is seeking partners and school organizations or districts to implement its products on a
trial run, knowing the results no doubt will exceed expectations and become a staple in their education
process.
Key2Enable’s founders William Oliveira, J. Rubinger and Tifany Espíndola