Early-stage venture capital firm Helion Advisors is investing $3.5 million in Vienova Education, a Delhi-based affordable private education provider. This follows the first round of funding by Indian Angel Network (IAN) and others three years ago.
Vienova leverages technology to provide a range of educational services to schools in North India. The company has been founded Parikshit Jain, an IIT-Delhi and IIM-Ahmedabad alumni with six-plus years of experience at the consulting major McKinsey & Co. Speaking to VCCircle, he said, “We are present in western UP and are now looking to expand to Haryana, Uttarakhand and eastern Rajasthan.”
The company is looking at expanding its services to 100 schools in the near future and will use the fresh investments to fuel this growth.
“By relying on innovative teaching practices and technologies, leading to huge customer traction, we aspire to quadruple our current content to over 20,000 hours by 2014. By cashing in on the strong customer demand from private sector schools, we shall continue our rapid growth and hope to achieve revenues of $15 million by 2014,” said Jain who is also the CEO of the firm.
Sanjeev Aggarwal, senior managing director of Helion Advisors, joins the board of Vienova as a part of the investment deal. Its existing board members include Saurabh Srivastava (co-founder of IAN and an angel investor) and Rohit Chand (serial entrepreneur who started IIS-Infotech – now Steria India – and Axis-IT&T).
Helion is a multi-stage, India-focused venture fund managing $ 350 million. The fund invests in businesses which are either technology-powered or catering to the Indian consumer services space. The fund has investments across sectors like outsourcing, Internet, mobile, technology products, retail services, education and financial services.
Sanjeev Aggarwal said, “Education offers interesting opportunities, particularly in the mass market segment, for investors with a 5-10 year horizon. Vienova has demonstrated an impressive understanding of the nuances of ‘affordable quality education’ in tier II and tier III cities and semi-urban areas. With this round of funding, Vienova looks well poised for the next phase of growth.”
