Top 10 EdTech Startups in India

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The word on the market these days is EdTech. The 2019 COVID-19 pandemic witnessed a dramatic change in the education startup landscape of the country. It gave education technology startups (EdTech startups) a powerful reason to rise up and make their mark. Whether in the form of online coding classes, k-12 coaching modules or byte-sized courses for higher education and professionals in the industry, without education startups, 2020 would have been a big setback for education in India.

A joint report by the Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) India and market research major Nielsen, reveals that there has been a 30 per cent increase in the time spent on education apps on smartphones since the lockdown. According to Google Trends, searches for ‘EdTech’ and ‘EdTech companies’ soared 60 per cent among Indians between April and December 2020.

Naturally, EdTech funding also saw a major boost. From $522 million in 2019 to a whopping $2.2 billion in 2020, efforts to boost EdTech and cater to the new normal have been tremendous. This is the reason the best EdTech companies witnessed a J curve attracting the interests of investors, entrepreneurs and various stakeholders like never before.

Emerging as a market poised to touch $10.2 billion in the next five years, let us have a look at the top EdTech companies in India.

1.BYJU’s

Headcount: 3200 | Headquarters: Bengaluru | Year Founded: 2011 |Founders: Byju Raveendran and Divya Gokulnath | Largest job functions: Education, Business Development, edtech marketing strategy.

What to know about Byju’s: Edtech unicorn and currently the world’s most valuable Edtech company, Byju’s is building itself into a digital and online learning powerhouse by focusing on everything from K-12 to competitive test preparation to professional education. Byju’s has gone on a shopping spree by acquiring six startups in 2021 alone, and shelling out close to $3 billion overall. Byjus’s has acquired Aakash Institute as well.

2.Unacademy

What to know about Unacademy: Right on the heels of its competitor Byju’s, Unacademy became the second edtech startup to enter India’s unicorn club. It claims to have a network of 50,000 pls registered educators and over 62 million learners. It expanded its reach in the test-preparation segment in 2020 by acquiring NeoStencil, PrepLadder, Kreatryx and Coursavy , boosted its presence in the K-12 learning space with Blume-backed Mastree and powered up its programming segment with CodeChef.

3.UpGrad

Headcount| 2000+ employees | Headquarters: Mumbai | year founded: 2015 | Most common skills: Digital Marketing, SQL, Customer Relationship Management | Largest Job functions: Education, Media and communications and engineering

What to know about UpGrad: UpGrad has earmarked $250 million for M&As over the next seven to nine months. By the month of March 2022, it is expected to cross $500 million annual revenue run rate and is currently looking to raise close to $400 million at a $4 billion valuation. In a short span this edtech company has captured close to 70 percent of the India higher education market for working professionals.

4.Vedantu

Headcount: 5000+ | Headquarters: Bangalore | Year Founded: 2011 | Founders: Vamsi Krishna, Pulkit Jain, Anand Prakash, Saurabh Saxena | Most common skills: Pre-skills, K-12, JEE/NEET | Largest job functions: Education, Media and Marketing

What to know about Vedantu: Vedantu can be said to be one of the pioneers of online interactive tutoring in India. It recently acquired AI-enabled learning startup Pedagogy, its second acquisition. Currently in 2021, the edtech company is witnessing a Year-on-year growth of 4x. With over 35 million students on its platform, it has plans to increase its topline run rate from $65 million to $200 million by next year.

5.Gradeup

Headcount: 736 | Headquarters: Noida, UP | Year founded: 2015 | Founders: Shobhit Bhatnagar | Most common skills: Preparation for JEE, NEET, UPSC, Defence, SSC, Banking, Teaching and State level exams | Largest Job functions: Marketing, Education and Media | edtech marketing strategy

What to know about Gradeup: One of India’s most trusted exam preparation platforms, Gradeup helps more than 3 crore registered students prepare actively for various exams. Backed by Times Internet, its net revenue stood at Rs. 60 crore in FY21 growing 2.5 times over FY20, as claimed by the edtech company. With a monthly active user base of about 3.5 million-4 million students, live courses, diverse test series for all competitive exams, Gradeup claims this support is its USP.

6.Lido Learning

Headcount: 1100+ | Headquarters: Mumbai | Year Founded: 2019 | Founders: Sahil Sheth | Most common skills: K-10 | Largest job functions: Marketing, Sales and Customer support, Education

What to know about Lido Learning: In the first half of 2021, the company has recorded a monthly revenue growth of 56% reaching a $20 million run rate. The newly launched education startup has recently projected a run-rate of $100 million. With its impressive growth, it has recently added around 1000 new hires to its fold and has also expanded to students in UAE, Qatar and Saudi Arabia

7.Meritnation

What to know about Meritnation: This education startup is India’s first online learning platform for school students with over 2.5 crore students across CBSE, ICSE and other leading state boards and part of the larger Aakash Educational Services Limited (AESL). The edtech company posted net sales of Rs 34.7 crore for the fiscal year 2018-19 as against Rs 30 crore the year before. Till date, it has more than 10 million plus app downloads and more than 2.5 crore registered users.

8.Doubtnut

What to know about Doubtnut: One of the initial acquisition picks for Byjus which failed due to differences in valuation, Doubtnut has emerged as a major contender in the 6-12 and NEET/JEE segments among edtech companies. Its app offers solutions for over 65 million questions a month in multiple languages for students of CBSE and 15 other state boards. Earlier this year, it raised Rs. 224 crore in a series B funding round from SIG and Lupa Systems. It has more than 2.5 million daily active users who spend more than 600 million minutes per month on the platform.

9.Testbook

Headcount: 700+ | Headquarters: Navi Mumbai | Year founded: 2013 | Narendra Agrawal, Praveen Agrawal, Manoj Munna, Yadvendar Champawat, Abhishek Sagar, Ashutosh Kumar | Most common skills: Competitive exam preparation | Largest job functions: Education, technology, Marketing

What to know about Testbook: Claiming to be the fastest rising startup in the EdTech space, Testbook has a registered user base of 140+ lakh students, 470+ crore questions solved on a web and is on a run to capture the bigger markets in the education technology space. The platform has 1.8 crore registered users, over 18 lakh paid users and claim to have placed over 50,000 students through their job placements.

10.Awign Enterprises

Headcount: 400+ | Headquarters: Bangalore | Year founded: 2016 | Founders: Gurpreet Singh, Praveen Sah & Annanya Sarthak | Most common skills: Gig work for companies | Largest job functions: Skill development, Marketing, technology

What to know about Awign Enterprises: This Bengaluru based edtech startup is a gig-workforce training platform that has worked with over 1.5 lakh people, and grown 30x in the sinc March 2018. It claims to be India’s largest ‘work fulfilment’ platform having served over 100+ brands and fulfilling 3 million micro jobs for different partners. Currently the company has its presence in more than 9000 pin codes across 400+ cities across India.

With unique business models and product offerings, edtech has emerged as a key market for profitable players and as a digital marketing agency in India, IndoAge provides best in class edtech marketing strategy