Facebook baced Edtech company Unacademy acquires Chandigarh based startup PrepLadder
Facebook backed Indian online learning platform Unacademy on 7th July 2020 revealed that it had acquired Chandigarh-based startup PrepLadder for USD 50 million in cash and stock deals as Facebook-backed edtech giant looks to extend its footprint in the region.
According to PrepLadder, co-founder of Deepanshu Goyal, PrepLadder has around 150 staff and provides courses for medical students. The two-year startup, which never received any money from external investors, has more than 80,000 subscribers. The Unacademy and PrepLadder will work toward the shared aim of making quality education available to everyone. And both agree that synergies between the two goods can establish a mark in the industry.
The purchase of PrepLadder comes as both Unacademy and Byju’s, India’s two edtech leaders have engaged in M&A talks with a number of local startups over the last few months to help their dominance in the country. According to Gaurav Munjal, co-founder, and chief executive officer of Unacademy, company is open talk with more startups to explore opportunities to work together.
Byju’s is in the advanced stages of negotiations to acquire Doubtnut, another edtech startup, for as much as USD 150 million. Through this purchase, the company aims to extend its scope into smaller cities and towns. The nine-year-old company, which last month was valued at USD 10.5 billion, is also talking to Whitehat Jr, an online platform that teaches children how to code. It is also reported that the Indian startup Unacademy is also in discussions for acquisition with the Bangalore-based startup tutoring company Mastree.
The Unacademy has intensified its development in recent months as schools around the country closed to avoid the spread of COVID-19. The startup, which started as a YouTube channel in 2015, has introduced more than 30 million learners to the site. More than 700,000 users access the app and the website every day. Unacademy continues to deliver hundreds of courses free of charge to school-going students. Yet a premium subscription service was also launched last year.
According to Unacademy, its website had accumulated more than 200000 subscribers. In the last three months, Unacademy’s subscriber base has increased by 100 percent. With increased stress on online learning in recent times, the daily average watch time across the Unacademy platforms has seen a steep increase of 100 percent. Monthly watch time minutes have also hit an all-time high of over 1 billion.
