Unacademy Acquires Kreatryx To Strengthen GATE, ESE Category

Bengaluru-based edtech startup Unacademy has acquired Delhi-based edtech startup Kreatryx in a cash and stock deal today.

Post-acquisition, Kreatryx will continue to run as a separate brand under Unacademy Brands. Kreatryx founder and CEO Ankit Goyal will join the team and run the brand independently as he joins WifiStudy’s Dinesh Godara’s team. The acquisition would allow Unacademy to get an edge over the competition in the GATE and ESE segment in the test prep market.

Founded in 2014 by Goyal, Kreatryx offers video, test series and postal tracking platform for GATE and ESE exams. The company’s website claims to have over 50K registered aspirants, with over 100K hours watched and more than 4 Mn questions attempted.

Founded in 2010 by Gaurav Munjal, Roman Saini, and Hemesh Singh, Unacademy had begun its journey with a free YouTube tutorial to teach students, but in 2015, the company started offering free learning in lessons on every possible topic in multiple languages.

Today, the company has more than 10K registered educators and 13 Mn learners. The company claims to have 100 Mn monthly views across its various platforms such as Unacademy, Unacademy Plus, Wifistudy, Chamomile Tea with Toppers, Unacademy Studios and The Solutionists.

Earlier, Gaurav Munjal, cofounder and CEO, Unacademy said that the company has more than 90K active subscribers. “70% of our users are from tier 2 and tier 3 cities. More than 700 educators take classes on Unacademy every day. We have seen great outcomes across various examinations like NTA, UGC and CSIR recently,” he added.

Unacademy has raised more than $88.6 Mn from investors such as Facebook, Steadview Capital, Sequoia India, Nexus Venture Partners and Blume Ventures among others.

Inc42 had earlier reported that the company’s revenue has grown 3.19X in FY19 reaching INR 21.89 Cr, as against INR 5.22 Cr in FY18. But, for FY19, the company’s losses are 4.12X of its total revenue reaching INR 90.27 Cr, as against INR 23.58 Cr in FY18.

We had noted that it has started generating revenue from its Unacademy Plus portal, which is its subscription model. Further, the revenue from subscription plans is based upon the number of classes provided on a gross basis. And interestingly, for FY19, most of the company’s operational revenue came in from subscriptions.

According to Datalabs by Inc42, there are around 4450 edtech startups in India. The Future Of India’s $2 Bn Edtech Opportunity Report 2020 says that capital inflows into the test preparation and online certification segments are comparatively higher. Together, these two make up for 88% of the total funding in edtech startups.