Soft Bank backed edtech company Unacademy has fired about 250 employees. Of these, about 100 employees were working for the company’s business development and marketing team. At the same time, about 150 people were from the sales department. Moneycontrol gave this information quoting sources. According to reports, the company has taken this decision due to restructuring.
Unacademy said in a statement, ‘We have done restructuring as part of our continuous effort to streamline the company’s operations and increase business efficiency. This was necessary keeping in mind the goals and vision of the company. It was also necessary for sustainable growth and profitability, due to which some roles have been affected.’
About 4000 employees laid off in two years
There have been several rounds of layoffs in Unacademy in the last 2 years. According to sources, the number of employees of the company was more than 6000 in April 2022, which has now come down to 2000. About a month ago, the company’s co-founder and Chief Technology Officer Himesh Singh shifted himself from the executive role to the advisory role.
The company has a valuation of Rs 28,379 crore
Unacademy was founded by Gaurav Munjal, Roman Saini and Hemesh Singh in 2015. It provides online preparation for competitive exams. The company has so far raised funds worth $877 million (about Rs 7,318 crore).
The last time the company raised funds of $440 million (about Rs 3,672 crore) from Temasek, General Atlantic and others in August 2021. Then its valuation was $3.4 billion (about Rs 28,379 crore).
Unacademy has more than 1.3 crore online users
According to Statista’s report of 26 September 2023, Unacademy has more than 1.3 crore online users. Byju’s has the highest number of users at 15 crore. Apart from this, Vedantu has 3.5 crore users and Upgrade has 20 lakh users.
Last year, 12% of the employees were laid off in one go
Unacademy laid off 12% of its employees i.e. about 380 employees in the fourth round of March last year. According to reports, the company’s co-founder and CEO Gaurav Munjal informed about the layoff through a message on the morning of March 30, 2023. The message said that the layoff step is being taken to cut costs and make the business profitable.
