Introduction
Byju's online learning platform was started in 2015. The e-teacher has over 80 million students learning on its platform, including 5.5 million students with paid access to premium content. The company has an annual renewal rate of nearly 86%. During the lockdown last year, the company added 45 million new learners.
The online education services provider Byju's, the most valued education-technology (Ed-tech) company in India, has announced the acquisition of Aakash Educational Services Limited to enhance its presence in the exam preparation segment across the country. According to MoneyControl, this business deal is worth more than INR 7300 crore or $1 billion, which appears to be the biggest acquisition by Byju's to date. Although the company refused to disclose the exact amount of the deal, MoneyControl sources asserted the speculative amount.
Investments
As Byju's is the most valued education-technology (Ed-tech) startup in India, the company is backed by famous investment houses such as Chan-Zuckerberg Initiative, Tencent, Tiger Global, Sequoia Capital, Yuri Milner, and Mary Meeker. It is believed amongst experts that Byju's has raised over $2 billion in funding until now.
The Past Acquisitions
In 2017, Byju's acquired TutorVista and Edurite. In 2019, it acquired US-based Osmo for $120 million. And in 2020, it acquired coding training platform WhiteHat Jr for $300 million. Now, in 2021, as it added another big company into its basket, Aakash Education, the company will be able to provide education at a much larger scale in both, online and offline format.
Aakash Education
It's been 33 years since Aakash Education was founded, which helped thousands of students in the field of science to achieve their goals via entrance exams. The company has 215 centers with over 205,000 students studying right now. In 2019, the private equity firm Blackstone had purchased around 37% stake in Aakash, while unofficial data says the company was valued at $500 million at that time.
With the help of Aakash's reach, Byju's can dominate the Indian ed-tech market, giving tough competition to Unacademy, India's largest free online learning platform, and other small players.