Unacademy, once among India’s most valuable edtech startups, has been acquired by rival upGrad in an all-stock deal that values the company at just over EUR 172 million—roughly 94% below its 2021 peak valuation. The transaction closes a dramatic chapter for a company that once commanded a EUR 3 billion valuation at the height of the pandemic-era online learning boom.
The deal values Bengaluru-based Unacademy at ₹19.55 billion, or about EUR 178 million, according to upGrad co-founder and chairperson Ronnie Screwvala. Under the arrangement, Unacademy shareholders receive upGrad shares, while angel investors were cashed out at closing. The startup had been backed by SoftBank, Tiger Global, General Atlantic, and other global investors.
A Sale Well Below Peak Valuation
Unacademy co-founder and CEO Gaurav Munjal confirmed the completed deal in a post on X, nearly six months after the transaction was first announced in March. “We raised at a peak, but sold at a fraction of that,” he wrote. “I’m not going to dress these facts up.”
The sale proceeded even though Unacademy held about ₹9 billion (roughly EUR 82 million) in the bank and generated annual revenue of approximately ₹4 billion (around EUR 36 million), Munjal said. He noted that most of the company’s businesses were profitable or close to it, and that Unacademy had the option to keep operating independently. “Nobody was forcing this,” he wrote.
Founded in 2015, Unacademy spent heavily in 2020 and 2021 while competing against rivals such as Byju’s for students and educators as lockdowns drove demand for online learning. When physical classrooms reopened and edtech demand fell sharply, the company reduced costs, laid off staff, and restructured parts of its operations before returning most of its business lines to profitability.
Why Unacademy Chose upGrad
Despite its financial position, Unacademy’s leadership concluded that reaching greater scale or an eventual public listing would require expansion into additional areas of education, according to two people familiar with the matter. Joining upGrad, which has built a larger footprint in offline education, offered one path toward that goal.
The Unacademy brand will be retained, and the deal covers the entire group. The company reports that its free educational videos on YouTube have amassed more than 10 billion views.
Airlearn Included in the Deal
Airlearn, Unacademy’s language-learning app, is also part of the acquisition and will remain under upGrad for now. Screwvala described the company as “very excited and positive” about the business. Within roughly six months, Munjal and Screwvala are expected to decide whether to continue developing the roughly 25-person operation internally or raise outside capital for it.
Late last year, Munjal explored raising external funding for Airlearn and received term sheets from investors, but abandoned those plans as talks with upGrad advanced, according to a person familiar with the matter. “To see a product coming out of India gaining traction globally is a great example of what is possible when the thinking, product and ambition are not limited by geography,” Screwvala wrote on X.
The two-year-old platform serves 10 million users across more than 150 countries.
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