Byju's to invest $200 mn in physical tuition centres over 12-18 months

Edutech firm Byju's plan to open 500 centres in 200 cities this year; enroll 1 mn students over 2 years

Edtech start-up Byju’s will invest upwards of $200 million to open brick and morter tuition centres in the next 12-18 months. With positive feedback from the first 80 centres launched as part of the pilot programme since December, the company has decided to launch 500 centres in 200 cities this year.

Byju's IPO is expected in this year's line-up post achieving $20 billion valuation in its last funding.

"The tuition centres will combine digital with physical as the classes will have two teachers – one present in the class and another who will instruct through a screen in the classroom." said Byju's

Mrinal Mohit, chief operating officer of Byju’s, said the tuition classes will be available for students from classes IV to X and carry an average price tag of Rs 3,000- 3,500 per month. The company expects to enroll over 1 million students in its tuition centres over the next two years, with a batch size of 25 students in each class.

“These tech-enabled physical centres have been designed to offer world class learning and personalised education to unlock a student’s full potential with a focus on engagement and better outcomes. We believe this is our biggest differentiator,” said Mohit.

With schools and coaching institutes having been shut time and again since the pandemic’s outbreak in March 2020, the company said it has baked such Covid-related uncertainties into its model.

“Each of these centres will support the learning of about 2,000 to 5,000 students. The real estate cost is much lower than when all the classes happen offline. For this reason, it is a really attractive model for us. Although it is early days to make any projections, we are very bullish on the RoI from this product,” said Mohit. Last year, Byju’s acquired Aakash Educational Services, known primarily for its science coaching centres for class XI and XII students preparing for engineering and medical entrance exams, for $1 billion.

“Although we are taking the centres on lease and then building them from scratch, we have learnt a lot from Aakash’s operations and how they went hybrid amid the pandemic. We have leveraged their expertise while designing the tuition classes product,” said Himanshu Bajaj, head of Byju’s Tuition Centre.

The offering has been designed in such a way that students will get to bridge learning gaps, strengthen conceptual understanding, and reinforce learning through regular practice and tests that ensures exam readiness. Students will also have the same teacher for their offline and online classes who will support them with personalised learning.

With 115 million registered students and 7 million paid subscriptions, Byju’s said it has an annual renewal rate of 86 per cent for its edtech products.