Byju's employees meet Kerala minister after 170 staff are 'asked to resign'

A group of Byju’s employees on Tuesday met Kerala labour minister V Sivankutty, alleging that the edtech giant was forcing more than 170 staffers to resign, as it looked to discontinue operations and close its Thiruvananthapuram office.

“The employees of Byju’s app from Technopark Thiruvananthapuram had come to see me. The employees have many grievances, including job loss. The Labour Department will conduct a serious investigation in this regard,” Minister Sivankutty posted on his Facebook page.

TechnoparkToday, a community digital media platform for IT professionals said that Byju’s, which was  working in Carnival building, at Technopark , was planning to stop its operations.  “The company management is enforcing employees for forceful resignation,” it said.

Prathidhwani, the welfare organisation of techies took up the issue and requested the labour minister  to intervene and help employees reach an amicable and dignified settlement with the firm and a revised exit policy with compensatory benefits. 

These include payment of the salary for October 2022 on the November 1, 2022, and a one-time settlement of salary for the upcoming three months. They also want ‘all earned leaves’ encashment and  full settlement of variable pay (as applicable to each employee).

“Honorable minister Sri V Sivankutty assured that Labour Dept. will intervene in the same,” said the post.

Byju's App employees and Prathidhwani representatives were present during the discussion with the minister.

 According to the sources, the move is part of Byju’s “optimisation plan” where to lay off nearly 2,500, or 5 per cent, of its 50,000 employees. The move by India’s most valuable start-up comes amid a funding winter and steep losses. In June, Byju’s laid off about 600 employees at its group companies —WhiteHat Jr and Toppr. It was a move to drive cost efficiency, according to the company.

Byju’s booked a loss of Rs 4,588 crore for the financial year ended March 31, 2021, 19 times more than the preceding year, according to its latest financial report.

Under the optimisation plan, the company said it looks to target profitability by March 2023 and bring the K10 subsidiaries — Meritnation, TutorVista, Scholar, and HashLearn — under the India business unit. Aakash and Great Learning would function separately.

The company is also realigning marketing spending to enhance its global footprint.

“In this ongoing organizational restructuring for profitable growth, Byju’s is making every attempt to offer relevant relocation opportunities to the affected employees,” said Byju’s spokesperson. “In this regard, while we are discontinuing our Trivandrum operations to reduce redundancy, we are also offering the entire Trivandrum team an opportunity to relocate to Bengaluru.”

Byju's said the number of employees that would get impacted in the restructuring at Trivandrum are 140. The firm said it has provided them more than a month's time to decide on this matter.

“ If they choose to not use this opportunity, we have made available a generous and progressive exit package to all employees impacted by the restructuring,” said Byju’s spokesperson.

This includes extended health insurance benefits, outplacement services, and garden leave. Byju’s said the package even includes an assured opportunity to be rehired by Byju’s within the next 12 months at any operational center across India.

Byju’s is discontinuing its operations from Trivandrum at a time when the firm recently raised $250 million from Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) and existing investors as the company targets profitability by March next year. The valuation of the Bengaluru-based firm remains at $22 billion, informed sources.

Byju’s has raised total funding of about $5.7 billion from investors like Sumeru Ventures, Vitruvian Partners, BlackRock, Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, Sequoia, Silver Lake, Bond Capital, Tencent, General Atlantic, Tiger Global, and QIA. The firm has over 150 million learners.

It was founded by Byju Raveendran, a former teacher and the son of educators from Azhikode village in Kannur district of Kerala, along with his wife Divya Gokulnath in 2011 in Bengaluru.