Classplus raises $65mn funding from Tiger Global, GSV Ventures, AWI

Classplus, which helps educational institutions go online, on Thursday said it has raised USD 65 million (about Rs 482.3 crore) in funding, led by Tiger Global.

GSV Ventures, along with existing investors Alpha Wave Incubation (AWI), Blume Ventures, and RTP Global also participated in the Series C round, a statement said.

This is the fourth round of funding raised by the company in the last 15 months. Sequoia Capital's Surge and Times Internet are also the early backers of Classplus. BCCI President Sourav Ganguly has also invested in the company and also serves as the brand ambassador for them.

Founded by Mukul Rustagi and Bhaswat Agarwal in 2018, Classplus has digitised over one lakh tutors across 1,500 cities serving 20 million students. Classplus allows tutors to run all their coaching, communication, assessments, payments, and student engagement programmes through a full-stack mobile solution.

Besides taking them online, Classplus also enables educators to sell their online courses to grow their business outside their localities.

"We are on a mission to ensure that every educator can go online and connect with their students across the world. The power of educators has historically been confined to their local neighbourhoods. With Classplus, educators have been able to build and expand their online presence, and monetise their content without any major investment and effort, Classplus Chief Executive Officer and co-founder Mukul Rustagi said.

He added that with this growth financing, the company aims to "build the best-in-class products for educators, build great engineering teams, and grow geographically. We are hiring aggressively across engineering, product, and business roles".

When lockdowns struck India, Classplus emerged as the critical infrastructure software for the USD 30 billion offline tutoring industry. With the platform growing nearly 10x in the last 12 months, GSV views it as a 'Weapon of Mass Instruction', Deborah Quazzo, Managing Partner at GSV Ventures, said.

The edtech space has seen strong growth globally with the COVID-19 pandemic serving as an inflection point. A number of offline classes went online to continuity of education while ensuring adherence to social distancing norms.

A number of players have raised fresh funding from investors, along with consolidation as seen with deals like Unacademy acquiring PrepLadder and Byju's acquisition of Aakash Educational Services Limited.