One of the largest edtech acquisitions in the world has finally taken form, as the country’s biggest online-education startup Byju’s has announced to acquire the offline competitive examination preparator Aakash Educational Services Limited (AESL) for about $1 billion.
Reports of the two companies in conversation for the alleged acquisition deals have been in the picture for past some months now.
Byju’s Acquisition of Aakash Institute
The Covid-19 pandemic period has shifted the education sector completely to the online space, raising the profit margins for Byju’s by a lot.
Bangalore-based Byju’s is valued at $12 billion and has been on a fundraising spree due to the pandemic, reports Bloomberg.
Byju’s has signed a deal to acquire the ‘brick and mortar’ test preparatory offline leader Aakash Institute for $1 billion.
Aakash Institute has more than 200 centres across India and provides offline coaching preparations for engineering and medical aspirants, with a student count of over 250,000.
Byju’s will conduct the acquisition process strategically and conduct investments for accelerating growth at AESL.
More on the Acquisition
Aakash Educational Services founded in 1988, is among the country’s leading offline coaching classes for entrance exams.
Acquiring Aakash Institutes would boost Byju’s hold in the test preparatory segment.
Once the acquisition is complete, Aakash founders JC Chaudhry and Aakash Chaudhry will continue to lead AESL’s growth and expansion, while the two founders along with the equity management company Blackstone will become shareholders in Byju’s, states Entrackr.
Blackstone will swap a portion of its 37.5% equity in Aakash for Byju’s stake.
Comments are closed, but trackbacks and pingbacks are open.