BENGALURU: Edtech unicorn Physics Wallah on Friday introduced the closure of its largest funding spherical, elevating $210 million. India-focused hedge fund Hornbill Capital led the spherical, with participation from enterprise capital funds Lightspeed Enterprise Companions, GSV, and WestBridge Capital, bringing the corporate’s valuation to $2.8 billion.
The Noida-headquartered firm plans to rent 1,000 workers over the subsequent six to 9 months to construct capability in present companies and assist new initiatives, co-founder Prateek Maheshwari advised TOI in an interview.
“We shall be hiring throughout the board, together with advertising, gross sales, expertise, and enterprise improvement, each for our foremost enterprise and subsidiaries,” Maheshwari mentioned, including that the corporate’s complete workforce presently stands at about 15,000.
Along with investing in its present enterprise, Physics Wallah additionally plans to make use of the brand new funds for acquisitions. “We imagine South India is a deep market, and we might consider belongings which might be sturdy within the area. We’re additionally on the lookout for corporations wealthy in content material and teachers, similar to publication homes, which we wish to merge with,” Maheshwari mentioned.
Regardless of elevating important capital, founders Alakh Pandey and Maheshwari nonetheless retain 85% of the corporate’s fairness, with solely 15% diluted to institutional buyers. This can be a uncommon feat amongst Indian unicorns, that are startups with a valuation of $1 billion or extra.
Integrated as an organization in June 2020, Physics Wallah initially started as a YouTube channel in 2016. Co-founder Pandey, a physics trainer on whom the corporate’s model is constructed, returned to full-time instructing in Might after a yr targeted on operations, team-building, and different duties.
The corporate had final raised over $100 million in 2022 at a $1.1 billion valuation. Till then, Physics Wallah had been totally bootstrapped. Over time, the corporate has acquired a number of subsidiaries, together with iNeuron, PW Abilities, PW Institute of Innovation, and Xylem Studying.
The corporate’s offline enlargement contributed to a big improve in worker prices and provisioning for sure non-cash bills in FY23, resulting in a sevenfold rise in complete bills. These bills, together with one-time prices and non-cash bills, amounted to Rs 777 crore, in contrast with Rs 103 crore within the earlier yr.
Nonetheless, income from operations tripled to Rs 772 crore in FY23 on a standalone foundation, once more as a result of offline enlargement. The FY24 financials have but to be filed with the Registrar of Corporations.
The large funding for Physics Wallah comes at a time when Byju’s is present process insolvency proceedings, and different edtech incumbents similar to Unacademy are additionally making an attempt to increase by way of offline routes after going through stagnation post-Covid.
The Noida-headquartered firm plans to rent 1,000 workers over the subsequent six to 9 months to construct capability in present companies and assist new initiatives, co-founder Prateek Maheshwari advised TOI in an interview.
“We shall be hiring throughout the board, together with advertising, gross sales, expertise, and enterprise improvement, each for our foremost enterprise and subsidiaries,” Maheshwari mentioned, including that the corporate’s complete workforce presently stands at about 15,000.
Along with investing in its present enterprise, Physics Wallah additionally plans to make use of the brand new funds for acquisitions. “We imagine South India is a deep market, and we might consider belongings which might be sturdy within the area. We’re additionally on the lookout for corporations wealthy in content material and teachers, similar to publication homes, which we wish to merge with,” Maheshwari mentioned.
Regardless of elevating important capital, founders Alakh Pandey and Maheshwari nonetheless retain 85% of the corporate’s fairness, with solely 15% diluted to institutional buyers. This can be a uncommon feat amongst Indian unicorns, that are startups with a valuation of $1 billion or extra.
Integrated as an organization in June 2020, Physics Wallah initially started as a YouTube channel in 2016. Co-founder Pandey, a physics trainer on whom the corporate’s model is constructed, returned to full-time instructing in Might after a yr targeted on operations, team-building, and different duties.
The corporate had final raised over $100 million in 2022 at a $1.1 billion valuation. Till then, Physics Wallah had been totally bootstrapped. Over time, the corporate has acquired a number of subsidiaries, together with iNeuron, PW Abilities, PW Institute of Innovation, and Xylem Studying.
The corporate’s offline enlargement contributed to a big improve in worker prices and provisioning for sure non-cash bills in FY23, resulting in a sevenfold rise in complete bills. These bills, together with one-time prices and non-cash bills, amounted to Rs 777 crore, in contrast with Rs 103 crore within the earlier yr.
Nonetheless, income from operations tripled to Rs 772 crore in FY23 on a standalone foundation, once more as a result of offline enlargement. The FY24 financials have but to be filed with the Registrar of Corporations.
The large funding for Physics Wallah comes at a time when Byju’s is present process insolvency proceedings, and different edtech incumbents similar to Unacademy are additionally making an attempt to increase by way of offline routes after going through stagnation post-Covid.
