PhysicsWallah (PW), India’s sole profitable edtech unicorn, recorded another year of profitable operations thanks a sharp increase in revenue.
The company’s standalone net profit grew more than 14 times to ₹97.8 crore in the financial year ended March 2022 from ₹6.93 crore in the previous year, according to the audited financial results seen by Mint.
Standalone operating revenue jumped more than ninefold to ₹232.48 crore from ₹24.59 crore during the period. PhysicsWallah earns revenue from the sale of educational services such as lectures and sessions on YouTube, the PW app, and its website.
The Noida-headquartered edtech company entered the coveted unicorn club earlier this year after raising $100 million in a Series A round led by WestBridge Capital and GSV Ventures. In contrast to PW’s profitable operations, other edtech unicorn startups in the country have been facing losses over the years.
PW started as a YouTube channel in 2016 by Alakh Pandey and was later joined by Prateek Maheshwari. It primarily caters to students preparing for engineering and medical entrance exams. The company claims to have over 10 million followers on YouTube and over 5 million app downloads.
PW’s standalone expenses grew over sixfold to ₹103.17 crore in FY22, from ₹15.36 crore in FY21. Employee benefit expenses accounted for over 40% of the total costs at ₹42.18 crore, growing over 20 times from ₹2.01 crore in FY21.
Also, in FY22, PW spent 50% more on legal professional charges which grew to ₹16.92 crore, while advertising and promotional costs grew about 80 times to ₹11 crore against ₹0.14 crore in FY21.
The startup has now expanded to offline coaching classrooms. It has hybrid classes ‘Pathshalas’ in 22 cities and has also forayed into the offline space by launching ‘PW Vidyapeeth’ in six locations, including Kota and Delhi. It is further expanding its reach by introducing courses in vernacular languages such as Bengali, Kannada, Marathi, Telugu, and Gujarati.
The company has made three acquisitions this year. In October, it bought test preparation platform PrepOnline and exam preparation books publisher Altis Vortex. Earlier in August, it acquired Jaipur-based doubt-solving and resource management startup FreeCo.
