Edtech co Classplus raises $10 mn in fresh funding round

Riding the prevailing edtech wave in the country, Classplus, which offers independent tutors and coaching institutes a SaaS-based platform and mobile app to manage their operations, has raised Rs 75 crore (a little over $10 million) in a funding round, dubbed a Series C round, according to regulatory filings. 

The latest infusion in Noida headquartered Bunch Microtechnologies, which owns and operates Classplus, was led by Alpha Wave Incubation, an early stage investment entity backed by the Abu Dhabi state entity ADQ, which invested Rs 56.3 crore, the filings showed. Returning investors Blume Ventures and RTP Global Investments contributed Rs 11.2 crore and Rs 7.5 crore respectively.

The Series C fundraise by Classplus comes months after the company raised a Series B round, according to prior regulatory filings. In April this year, venture capital firm RTP Global, earlier known as ru-Net, led a Rs 73 crore (around $10 million at current foreign exchange rates) round, the filings showed. Other investors in the round included Blume Ventures, Sequoia Capital entity Surge Ventures II, Spiral Ventures Asia Fund and former Facebook executive Anand Chandrasekaran.

Founded in 2015 by Mukul Rustagi and Bhaswat Agarwal, Classplus has developed a mobile operating system that enables coaching institutes to take their brick and mortar setups online. The company aims to streamline the market by helping tutors run their communication, payments, assessments and online learning programmes on a full-stack mobile solution that doubles up as their online content repository.

In May the company said that over 3,500 coaching centres across 70 cities, mostly in second and third tier cities, used its platform.

The Classplus funding is in line with an uptick in investor interest in the broader edtech market in recent months, notably with the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic. Online test preparation and tutoring platforms, in particular, have been big beneficiaries of offline classes and tutoring moving online on account of lockdowns in India and across the world. Investors have moved in quickly to make the most of potentially big returns from opportunities arising out of the pandemic afflicted sector.

Recently, test preparation platform Unacademy became the second edtech unicorn in India, followed by a $150 million investment from the SoftBank Group. Byju’s, which is valued at over $10 billion, announced a new infusion from private equity firm Silver Lake and returning investors earlier this month. Executive education platform Eruditus announced raising $113 million from Leeds Illuminate and Prosus Ventures. Additionally, Coatue Management led a $100 million round in K-12 online tutoring platform Vedantu in July. 

(Note: The story has been updated with details from regulatory filings.)