Edtech major upGrad on Monday announced a fresh round of fundraise from marquee investors amid a looming funding winter and layoff season across companies.
upGrad, in a statement, announced that it has raised $210 million in a round that saw participation from ETS Global, Bodhi Tree, Kaizen Management Advisors and others. Moreover, the founder group also invested $12.5 million in this round to maintain their over 50 per cent ownership in upGrad.
Meanwhile, the company also mentioned that its team strength will grow to 7600 from the present 4800 in the next 3 months and will also include about 170 full-time faculty, 1600 teachers, and over 5000 on-contract coaches and mentors as it aims to build one of the largest full-time edtech faculty in the world.
"Bucking the slowdown trend within the sector, upGrad has remained bullish with its program completion rate of 80%+ and has emerged as a global leader in the higher education segment. 40% of the company's total revenue is realized from Repeats and Referrals year-on-year," it stated.
“Higher EdTech will be on the rise for the next 4 to 5 decades. upGrad in the last 12 months has re-shaped itself to be the most integrated company in this space with career opportunities for the College learners and Working Professionals from the age of 18 to 58 and will be a LifeLongLearning partner for millions in the coming years. We have always been very capital efficient while growing 100% year-on-year and hope to retain that discipline," said upGrad Co-founders, Ronnie Screwvala and Mayank Kumar in a joint statement while commenting on the fund raise.
The company added that it is on track to record annual gross revenue of $400-$500 million during FY23 out of which about 45 per cent of total revenue will be realised from its own-branded online courses and programs.