Ed-tech startup Byju’s story now a Harvard Business School case study

Bangalore-based ed-tech firm Byju's success story has been selected as a Harvard Business School case study, the company said on Thursday.

This case study, titled as “BYJU’S The Learning App”, will be available for teaching purposes within and outside Harvard University, the startup said in a press statement.

The case study is written by John Jong-Hyun Kim, a senior lecturer at Harvard Business School, and Rachna Tahilyani, associate director at Harvard Business School India Research Center.

It analyses the growth of the learning app and its impact on students. It also discusses how the startup combined content, media and technology to create a learning app for students across the globe.

Byju Raveendran, founder and chief executive of Byju's, said: “At Byju's, our mission is to create personalised and engaging learning experiences for children. With technology as an enabler, we focus on developing learning programs that will cater to the unique learning requirements of every student in India and abroad.”

Byju’s, run by Think & Learn Pvt. Ltd, has raised around $170 million over the past year as it seeks to become a global player in the tech-driven K-12 education business. It is spending a substantial amount of money to expand in India and other English-speaking countries.

In March, Byju's had raised an undisclosed amount of funding from Belgian family office Verlinvest. This followed a $15-million round by International Finance Corporation, the World Bank’s private-sector investment arm, in December.

The startup previously secured $75 million from Sequoia India and Belgian investment firm Sofina in March 2016 and $50 million in a round co-led by the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative in September. It was the first Asian investment by the philanthropic foundation of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan.

Byju's app claims to have 8 million downloads and 400,000 annual paid subscribers. It offers learning programmes for students in K-12 classes and competitive exams like engineering, management and civil services.