NEWS
Ed tech & services
Venture capitalists rained $4.5bn onto ed techs during ‘unprecedented’ first half Some $4.5 billion of venture funding was poured into ed techs during the first half of this year, according to HolonIQ, an “unprecedented” period in which investors sought to capitalise on a boom in online learning. The first six months of 2020 were “momentous”, the data provider’s chief executive Patrick Brothers said, noting that there are now 19 ed tech ‘unicorns’ – whose valuations exceed $1 billion – which have collectively raised
more than $9 billion over the past decade. “Keep an eye out over the next six months as new investors, large and small, around the world seek to deploy capital to fuel education innovation at scale,” said Brothers, whose organisation forecasts that the next 10 years will see more than $87 billion injected into ed tech. Over the past six months, during which schools, universities and other educational centres have been forced to close to curb the
spread of Covid-19, investors have sought to supply fledgling companies with cash to scale to meet rising demand for online education. The $4.5 billion invested in ed tech over the past six months exceeds the $4.4 billion rained on education start-ups throughout the whole of 2017. It represents more than half of the $7 billion of investment recorded last year. The past six months have
spawned numerous new ed tech unicorns, including Quizlet, which in May was valued at around $1 billion when it raised $30 million in a Series C. More recently, in July, Indian online tutoring platform Byju’s became ed tech’s first ‘decacorn’, a term given to companies whose value exceeds $10 billion, when it reached a $10.5 billion valuation in securing investment from Bond, the first female-founded venture capital fund.
India: World’s first ed tech ‘decacorn’ Byju’s to receive $400m injection from billionaire Investment firm DST Global, headed by billionaire Yuri Milner, is expected to give Indian online education firm Byju’s a $400 million injection. Byju’s, which earlier this year became the world’s first ‘decacorn’ as its valuation reached $10.5 billion, simplifies math and science concepts for K12 students through games and videos on an app. It has more than 57 million registered users and over 3.5 million paid subscribers. The start-up doubled revenues in the financial year that ended
in March 2020 to 28 billion rupees ($373 million) from the previous year. Billionaire Milner has previously backed large internet businesses including Alibaba, Facebook and
Twitter as well as a string of Indian start-ups across various sectors. Since inception in 2011, Byju’s has raised about $995 million from investors including Naspers, Tencent, Verlinvest, the Chan-
Zuckerberg Initiative, Sequoia Capital, Lightspeed Venture Partners and Aarin Capital. In January this year, Tiger Global Management, a US-based hedge fund, invested $200 million in Think and Learn, the technology company that owns the Indian learning app. Last year, Byju’s received $150 million from Owl Ventures and the Qatar Investment Authority, which recently participated in a $750 million funding round for Chinese online tutoring provider Zuoyebang.
Australia: Canva for Education raises $60m as valuation balloons to $6bn Ed tech unicorn Canva for Education has raised US$60 million of new funding as its valuation reached $6 billion. Since March, Canva said it has seen its number of active users increase tenfold, with users across 90,000 schools and universities worldwide using its platform. Since launching in 2013, Canva, which enables users to design “anything
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and publish anywhere” using dragand-drop tools, has amassed more than 30 million users across 190 countries. Canva’s platform facilitates the design of education-specific content, such as worksheets, lesson plans, how-to videos, infographics and presentations. It describes itself as a “one-stop shop for creating and collaborating in the classroom”.
EducationInvestor Global • July/August 2020