After making it to the TIME Magazine's first-ever list of 100 most influential companies, the ed-tech startup Byju's is set to become India's most valuable startup. The Bengaluru-based startup will raise about $150 million from UBS Group. The investment will be made by an entity that is a part of the UBS Asset Management.
Both the parties are in a discussion to invest additional money, which would take the total investment by UBS to around $300 million. UBS' investment in Byju's is critical as it could take the unicorn's valuation past digital payments startup Paytm, which was last valued at $16 billion.
The deal between UBS and Byju's was negotiated by Musaab Javed, a money manager at UBS, according to a Bloomberg report.
Byju's founder Byju Raveendran, who owns a third of the company said that the pandemic dramatically altered the acceptance of online learning in India. He added the Byju's K-12 app has more than 80 million registered users in India. This app provides animated tutorials of math and science via animated games featuring tutor demos.
The ed-tech startup raised approximately $1 billion from the Facebook Inc. co-founder Eduardo Saverin's B Capital Group, Baron Funds and XN.
Byju's, which reaped massive gains from the COVID-19 fuelled online learning boom in India, has added many big names to its list of investors. These include Silver Lake Management, Owl Ventures and T. Rowe Price apart from its previous investors like Chan Zuckerberg-Initiative, Naspers Limited, and Tiger Global Management.
Edited by Mehak Agarwal
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