Unacademy’s Graphy Acquires Scenes To Strengthen Creator Offerings

Edtech unicorn Unacademy-owned SaaS platform Graphy on Wednesday (June 21) said it has acquired community platform Scenes. However, it didn’t disclose the financial details of the deal. 

The acquisition will enable Graphy to expand its product offerings and reach in the creator ecosystem, Graphy said in a statement. 

Besides, the acquisition will help Scenes utilise Unacademy’s resource base, expertise and content library to further fuel its growth. This is Unacademy-backed Graphy’s first acquisition in 2023. 

“The acquisition of Scenes is a strategic move aimed at strengthening our leadership position in the creator economy… Scenes has built a robust community platform for creators and this acquisition aligns with our vision of helping creators and educators build and scale their online knowledge business,” said Graphy cofounder and CEO Sumit Jain.

Founded in 2019 by Varun Mayya, Abhinav Arora and Shashank Udupa as Avalon Meta, Scenes is a B2B SaaS platform that offers a cloud-based community engagement platform. It enables creators to moderate and monetise their communities across multiple platforms in a single app. 

Commenting on the acquisition, Scenes cofounder and CEO Varun Mayya said, “Scenes has been an exciting journey. We’ve partnered with a lot of large creators and businesses over the years. The Scenes product and customers could not have found a better home than Graphy.”

As per Tracxn, Scenes last raised funding in May 2021 from the likes of Blume Founders Fund, Better Capital, Whiteboard Capital, as well as angel investors such as CRED’s Kunal Shah and creator Tanmay Bhat.

It is pertinent to note that Unacademy cofounders Gaurav Munjal and Roman Saini are also existing investors in the SaaS-based community platform. 

On the other hand, Graphy is a creator-focussed SaaS platform that came into being as a result of internal tinkering at Unacademy. It allows users to launch and distribute their online course and manage allied operations. It is the brainchild of Jain, Shobhit Bakliwal and Sushil Kumar. It was founded in 2020 and claims to have catered to 1 Lakh users so far. 

Earlier in 2021, Graphy also acquired Noida-based edtech startup Spayee for $25 Mn. 

Unacademy Chases Profitability 

The move to acquire Scenes comes as Unacademy chases profitability amid the slowdown in the edtech startup ecosystem. The edtech major’s net loss surged 85% year-on-year to INR 2,848 Cr in FY22. 

The acquisition spree of 2021 has also not paid off for Unacademy yet even as it continues to scale its offline offerings. The unicorn has fired nearly 2,000 employees since last year in its bid to cut costs and turn profitable.

However, the tide seems to be turning as the company recently told employees that it has ‘significantly reduced’ its burn rate and is set to ‘almost generate’ a profit at the group level in April 2023. 

CEO Gaurav Munjal said that the startup had over INR 2,100 Cr in its bank accounts at the end of March 2023 and would have 9.6 years of runway left by the end of 2023.

The acquisition also comes in the middle of an M&A wave that has gripped the homegrown startup ecosystem, especially the edtech sector. Days ago, Adda247 acquired experiential learning platform Veeksha for an undisclosed amount. Prior to this, PhysicsWallah picked up a 50% stake in Kerala-based Xylem Learning.

Besides, another edtech player FrontRow was also said to be scouting a potential acquisition after laying off nearly 90% of its workforce over many months.