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    Unacademy valued at $2 billion in new financing by Tiger Global, Dragoneer

    Synopsis

    Unacademy has seen its valuation jump from $510 million in February this year to $2 billion in the current round, in line with larger rival Byju's that has seen a similar valuation bump this year.

    Unacademy fundingETtech
    Illustration: Rahul Awasthi
    Education technology startup Unacademy has raised an undisclosed amount from Tiger Global Management and Dragoneer Investment Group, valuing the Bengaluru-based company at $2 billion.

    The latest investment comes just two months after Unacademy raised $150 million led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2 at a valuation of $1.45 billion.

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    The company has seen valuations quadruple from February when it had raised $110 million from Facebook and General Atlantic.

    Unacademy’s surging valuation and sustained fundraising is in line with larger rival Byju’s, which has raised close to $1 billion in 2020 so far and is again in talks to raise a further $200 million from US asset manager T Rowe Price and existing investor BlackRock, valuing the Bengaluru-based firm at $12 billion, ET reported on Saturday.

    “I’m delighted to welcome Tiger Global and Dragoneer as our partners,” said Gaurav Munjal, cofounder and CEO of Unacademy. “Our mission from Day One has been to democratise education and make it more affordable and accessible.”


    Byju’s, too, has seen its valuation surge significantly this year, from $8 billion to $11.1 billion currently. The growth has come on the back of the Covid-19 pandemic, which has created a surge in student signups on ed-tech platforms in India, which is pushing companies to raise as much money at a high valuation right now, according to market watchers.

    The funding spree is also driven by consolidation in the sector, with Byju’s picking up smaller rival WhiteHat Jr for $300 million earlier this year, while Unacademy has made a slew of acquisitions this year including Coursavy, Kreatryx, and PrepLadder.

    “The Unacademy team has innovated rapidly to build a leading platform that is taking education to the farthest corners of India. We are very excited to partner with Unacademy and look forward to seeing it scale further,” said Scott Shleifer, Partner at Tiger Global.

    Unacademy said it has over 47,000 educators on its platform who teach students spread across 5,000 cities in 14 different languages.

    The company said over 150,000 live classes are conducted on its platform each month.

    In September, Munjal said that the company had grown its revenues by nearly 9X in the last 12 months.
    ( Originally published on Nov 25, 2020 )
    The Economic Times

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