Byju’s, an educational technology company, has raised $ 500 million in a new round of financing from Silver Lake, the world’s leading technology investment firm, according to sources.
Although the company confirmed the development, it declined to reveal the amount.
This year, Silver Lake invested Rs 10,202 crore into Jio Platforms led by Mukesh Ambani.
Existing investors Tiger Global, General Atlantic and Owl Ventures also participate in this round. The new financing has increased the valuation of the Bengaluru-based company to $ 10.8 billion.
The company was valued at $ 10.5 billion when it received funding from Silicon Valley analyst and investor Mary Meeker’s Bond Capital in June.
“We are excited to welcome a strong partner like Silver Lake to the Byju family,” said Byju Raveendran, Founder and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Byju’s.
“We are fortunate to be in a sector of positive relevance during this crisis. This has put online learning at the forefront and is helping parents, teachers, and students to experience and understand its value. Our classrooms are changing for possibly the first time in 100 years … we have to redefine the future of learning. “
Byju’s is closing the gap to become the most valuable start-up in the country after digital payments firm Paytm, which is valued at around $ 16 billion.
ALSO READ: Isha, Akash Ambani, Byju, Poonawalla Debut On Fortune ’40 Under 40 ‘List
He said it helped students learn during the pandemic. In response to the school closings, the company made the content of its learning app free to all students. In recent months, Byju’s has entered the after-school learning space with the launch of Byju’s Classes, a comprehensive online tutoring program.
“We are delighted to lead this investment and our partner Byju (Raveendran) and his impressive team of educational technology pioneers,” said Greg Mondre, Co-CEO of Silver Lake.
“We look forward to working with them as Byju’s builds and accelerates its compelling growth trajectory by forging new partnerships and continuing to cultivate a comprehensive ecosystem of innovative educational offerings.”
The Menlo Park, California-based private equity firm counts e-commerce giant Alibaba, ride-sharing company Didi Chuxing and home rental company Airbnb among its portfolio companies.
The other companies in the portfolio include Twitter, Alphabet’s autonomous business unit, Waymo, and Intelsat, the world’s largest provider of fixed satellite services.
ALSO READ: Kamath panel has little impact on retail, media and foodservice: experts
Since the shutdown began, Byju’s has seen more than 20 million new students start learning on its platform for free. Today, the app has more than 64 million registered students and 4.2 million paid subscriptions annually.
Byju’s had almost doubled its income from Rs 1,430 crore to Rs 2,800 crore in FY20. Now you are slowly moving toward the billion dollar revenue milestone.
Last month, Byju’s acquired WhiteHat Jr, a Mumbai-based educational technology start-up that teaches coding to kids, for $ 300 million. With encryption quickly emerging as a key skill for the future, this integration will accelerate Byju’s international expansion. The same month, Byju also raised $ 122 million from Israeli-Russian billionaire Yuri Milner’s investment fund, DST Global. Byju’s was reportedly in talks with DST to raise around $ 400 million, according to sources.
In total, Byju’s has raised more than $ 1.6 billion from investors, according to Crunchbase, a data platform.
Experts said that at a time when India was battling the pandemic, much of the country’s education sector, valued at $ 180 billion, was connecting to the internet, offering opportunities to educational technology players, including Byju’s. , Unacademy and Vedantu.
Unacademy, the company launched as a hobby on YouTube, raised $ 150 million this month in a round led by Japanese conglomerate SoftBank. This values it at $ 1.45 billion, a three-fold increase in just six months.
This also makes the Bengaluru-based company the first unicorn in the country’s educational technology space after Byju.
Last month, educational technology startup Eruditus raised $ 113 million in funding led by Leeds Illuminate and South African internet giant Prosus Ventures (formerly Naspers Ventures).
Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan’s philanthropic organization, the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, also participated in the round.
In July, Vedantu raised $ 100 million from the US-based investment firm Coatue with the participation of existing investors. With this round, the valuation of the Bengaluru-based company jumped to $ 600 million.
.
