New Delhi: Edtech major Byju's has raised about Rs 2,200 crore in funding from a clutch of investors including Oxshott Venture Fund X LLC, XN Exponent Holdings Ltd and others, according to regulatory documents.
Over the past few months, Byju's has raised funding from a slew of investors that has placed the edtech major among the most-valued start-ups in the country. The latest round is estimated to have pushed the company's valuation to about $18 billion, up from a valuation of $16.5 billion in June this year.
"...in order to meet further funding requirements for business expansion, the company proposes to offer and issue up to 77,174 series F compulsorily convertible cumulative preference shares...at a securities premium of Rs 2,85,062 under private placement...," according to Registrar of Companies filing shared by market intelligence firm Tofler.
The filing added that 42,095 shares were allotted to Oxshott Venture Fund X LLC, while XN Exponent Holdings Ltd and Edelweiss Crossover Opportunities Fund Series III were allotted 5,262 shares and 5,261 shares, respectively.
Verition Multi-Strategy Master Fund, MasterX Byju's Fund I and Byjus Time Capital Advisors LP were among the other participants.
Byju's did not respond to queries on the matter.
Byju's is backed by marquee investors, including General Atlantic, Sequoia Capital, the Chan-Zuckerberg Initiative, Naspers, Silver Lake and Tiger Global.
The edtech space has seen strong growth globally, including in India, with the COVID-19 pandemic serving as an inflection point. Many offline classes went online to ensure continuity of education while adhering to social distancing norms.
Byju's, which has over 100 million registered students and 6.5 million paid subscribers, has been aggressively acquiring companies to bolster its presence across categories.
In the past, Byju's had acquired TutorVista and Edurite (from Pearson in 2017) and Osmo in 2019. Last year, the company had bought the coding training platform WhiteHat Jr for $300 million and in April this year, it acquired Aakash Educational Services Ltd (AESL) to bolster its presence in the test preparation segment in the country.
In July this year, Byju's had announced the acquisition of Singapore-headquartered Great Learning in a transaction valued at $600 million (about Rs 4,466 crore), and said it will invest an additional $400 million to strengthen its position in the professional and higher education segment.
It had also announced the acquisition of US-based digital reading platform Epic for $500 million (around Rs 3,729.8 crore), and an additional $1 billion (about Rs 7,459.7 crore) investment in the North American market in the same month.
In September, Byju's had said it will acquire coding platform Tynker for an undisclosed amount to further accelerate expansion in US market expansion.
