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Byju’s, the industry leader in EdTech that Byju Raveendran cofounded, finally released its financial statistics for the year that ended in March 2021 after months of delay.
BYJU’s growing losses at the most valuable unicorn in India, which was last valued at nearly $22 billion making it India’s most valued start-up. Which increased to 45.6 billion rupees ($573 million) from 3.1 billion rupees the year before as the business’s operating costs more than doubled. In the same period, revenue decreased by 3% to 24.3 billion rupees. On the recommendation of its auditors, Bangalore-based Byju’s postponed the recognition of nearly 40% of its income.
Earlier In March, BYJU’S announced a new cooperation with QIA, the sovereign wealth fund of Qatar, to establish a cutting-edge research facility and new EdTech company in Doha. BYJU’S has been named as an official sponsor of the “FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022.”
The business raised $800 million in a pre-IPO round in March and in a remarkable move, Raveendran financed $400 million of the investment using debt he had obtained from many foreign banks as the EdTech powerhouse prepped for an IPO (which has now been delayed owing to global macro-economic factors and economic slowdown).
In terms of revenue recognition, it is usual for an entrepreneur and an auditor to have differing interpretations of how revenue should be recognised, according to serial entrepreneur K. Ganesh. “Clearly Byju’s needs to take corrective action on numerous fronts,” he adds.
While the rise in demand for online education, notably during the pandemic, has aided Byju’s growth, the company has also been fast growing through acquisitions, buying about 15 businesses in India, Asia, and the US during the past six years.
The business has invested $2.6 billion in acquisitions since 2021, including $950 million for the Indian exam preparation company Aakash Educational Service and $600 million for Singapore’s Great Learning. According to a statement from the company, “Byju’s acquisitions across segments over the last year have witnessed tremendous growth.” Since the acquisition, the revenues of Aakash in the test preparation segment and Great Learning in the higher education segment have both doubled.
The company is cautious with its spending, according to Divya Gokulnath, who co-owns it with her husband, co-founder and CEO Byju Raveendran, despite rising criticism over this shopping binge. In a June interview with Forbes Asia, she noted, “We don’t spend just because there is capital.”
According to reports, the corporation is making a strong offer to buy Nasdaq-listed 2U, valuing the company at about $2 billion, more than three times its current market worth of $600 million. At the same time, it is preparing for organic expansion and aims to scale up in India by increasing its network of tuition centers from the more than 200 it presently has to 500 locations by the end of the year and tripling the number of teachers it employs to 20,000.
Over 3,000 workers have been laid off by EdTech platforms in India overall, and more than 7,000 people have lost their jobs in the startup sector as a whole.
Before developing Think & Learn with his wife in 2011 and his own tuition app, Raveendran provided exam preparation services. In accordance with Forbes’ Real-Time Billionaires list, the pair has a net worth of $3.5 billion. This was predicated on the company’s March valuation of $23 billion from its most recent investment round. In its most recent funding round, Byju’s raised $843 million, including over 400 million from Raveendran personally. According to reports, a promised $150 million from an investor has not yet been paid. It has drawn notable investors including Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, Tencent in China, and General Atlantic, a U.S. private equity firm.
