UpGrad Education Pvt Ltd, which runs the edtech platform upGrad, has raised Rs 300 crore (around $36.4 million) in an internal round, with co-founder Ronnie Screwvala contributing Rs 212 crore towards the capital raise.
Temasek invested Rs 81 crore, with the rest coming in from other existing investors, according to a statement.
"The company is focused on its organic and inorganic growth across multiple verticals of formal education via degree, diploma and doctorate courses in partnership with the best universities in India and globally,” the company added in the statement.
UpGrad was founded in 2015 by Screwvala, Mayank Kumar and Phalgun Kompalli.
It last raised $210 million (around Rs 1,638 crore) in August 2022 from investors including ETS Global, Bodhi Tree (a JV of James Murdoch and Uday Shankar) and Singapore's Kaizen Management Advisors Pvt. Ltd, which put the company’s valuation at around $2.25 billion.
The company reported losses of Rs 626.6 crore in the financial year (FY) ended March 2022, compared to Rs 211.1 crore in the previous year, VCCircle reported on 10 November.
This was on the back of rising expenses in advertising and promotion, for which the company spent Rs 424 crore in FY22, more than double of Rs 205.1 crore it spent in FY21, VCCircle reported.
upGrad operates out of 31 offices located in India, USA, UK, Middle East, Singapore & Vietnam.
It offers programs in skilling, short-certification courses, bootcamps and job-linked programs as well as programs through its Study Abroad platform. The company said it completed 22,000 placements into jobs in FY23.
It also announced its foray into the offline higher education space in November. The Mumbai-based startup said it was investing $30 million to set up ten global campuses across India, US and other regions next year. These will include five in India, three in the US and one each in Singapore and West Asia, the company said in a statement.
In the past, upGrad has made several acquisitions. Some of the acquired companies include Harappa Education, Exampur, Talentedge, Study Partners, Work Better, Knowledgehut, Impartus Innovation and Rekrut India.
