Upskilling startup BrightChamps Tech Pvt. Ltd has awarded $1 million worth of stock options to 400 of its ‘high performing’ teachers, the company announced on Tuesday.
The teachers across 25 markets will receive these stock options, with the majority of them coming from key geographies such as India, Indonesia, Vietnam, Singapore, Malaysia, South Africa, Egypt, Lebanon, and UAE.
The company said it is planning to award an increasing number of stock options every year for the next five years. BrightChamps currently consists of 2,500 teachers from 25 countries.
BrightChamps’ chief financial officer, Amit Kumar said, “Creating avenues for greater financial value for our teachers is a part of our long-term financial strategy. We were able to evaluate and reward teaching faculty across all four business verticals in this round and look forward to increasing coverage in the coming months.”
BrightChamps, founded in 2020 by Indian Institute of Technology Varanasi graduate Ravi Bhushan, is an edtech company that aims to bridge the gap between school education and children’s real learning needs. It aims to empower students to be technologically, financially, and socially smart by nurturing the potential of every child. In November 2021, BrightChamps raised $63 million at a valuation of $650 million from Premji Invest, GSV Ventures, Flipkart’s co-founder Binny Bansal, Beenext, and 021 Capital.
In February, BrightChamps announced the acquisition of Education10x, a financial literacy education platform for children, in a cash and stock deal. Education10x was founded by Indian Institute of Management Calcutta alumni Gyan Tiwari, Prasanna N. Muley, and Bhavishya Chaurasia. The company has developed the world’s first gamified finance program for children in the 8 to 16 years age group.
BrightChamps bought Singapore-based live-learning platform Schola for $15 million in a cash-and-stock deal. In June 2021, the edtech startup previously announced a $100mn investment war chest for mergers and acquisitions.
In the recent past, layoffs at edtech companies have become a common sight as they struggle to raise cash amid tough market conditions. The re-shift of education from online to offline has presented immense challenges for such startups, especially those operating in the business-to-customer (B2C) space.
Edtech startups will continue to face retrenchments in 2023. For instance, edtech unicorn Lead School sacked nearly 60 employees early this month after firing 100 employees in August, while upGrad-owned Harappa Education sacked 70 employees or 35% of its 200-strong workforce. More layoffs are likely at the company, the human resources department had told parting employees.
Unacademy-owned Relevel, too, fired 40 employees, or roughly 20% of its workforce so far in 2023, as it pivots to a test product app called NextLevel. Massive layoffs across sectors come after a blockbuster 2021 when startups collectively raised more than $35 billion in venture capital funding. 2022 saw VC funding drop 30% to around $24 billion, according to data by Venture Intelligence.
UpGrad-owned edtech platform Harappa Education has shown the door to around 70 employees or 35% of its 200-strong workforce.
