Byju’s — world’s most valued ed tech platform at the moment — is on hot streak of raising millions in investment. And that streak isn’t dropping down cold just yet. The company has announced that BlackRock, Sands Capital and Alkeon Capital have joined its current fundraising round of $500 million.
Media reports further suggest that online education platform is now valued at $11.1 billion. Earlier this month, Byju’s announced that it is raising $500 million led by the American VC firm Silver Lake and participation from existing investors – General Atlantic, Owl Ventures and Tiger Global. The investment led by Silver Lake put Byju’s valuation at $10.8 billion, making it the second most valuable startup in India.
Byju Raveendran, founder and CEO of Byju’s said, “We are excited to welcome Blackrock, Sands Capital and Alkeon as our partners. As we continue to create engaging and personalised learning solutions, partnerships like these reaffirm our commitment to build and transform the global learning landscape through technology, innovation and quality pedagogy. Continued support from our existing investors is a testament of their confidence in us and our mission”.
It is not a secret why Byju’s is attracting so many investors’ eyes. The current COVID-19 pandemic has forced students to stick to remote learning until physical classes are resumed. This has resulted in a huge boost for edtech startups such as Byju’s.
Since the onset of the pandemic, Byju’s has accumulated over 25 million new users, raising its total number of registered base users to 70 million. Of these total numbers, 4.5 million are paid subscribers. The long rounds of funding during the pandemic have been the best for the edtech company as it has raised close to $1 billion in 2020 only so far, which is way more than $916 million it had raised until 2019.
With the huge amount of funds Byju’s has received, it has invested that money further into consolidation through acquisition. Recently, it acquired a coding-learning platform, WhiteHat Jr. for $300 million. It has also bought US-based edtech startup Osmo to set its foot in the American market. LabinApp is another one of Byju’s acquisition, based out of Hubli that provides simulations of science experiments for students who cannot access the physical labs during the pandemic.
