Ex-Twitter India chief Manish Maheshwari's Invact Metaversity raises $5 mn

Antler India invested in Invact Metaversity alongside other global institutional investors like Arkam Ventures from India, Picus Capital, M Venture Partners, BECO Capital and 2am VC

Invact Metaversity, a platform built at the intersection of education and Web3, has raised a seed round of $5 million. Founded by former Head of Twitter India Manish Maheshwari and Tanay Pratap, a former software engineer at Microsoft, the company provides employability-focused training for securing jobs in tech companies.
 

The university is being built in the metaverse in order to foster an immersive environment conducive to learning, the company said. Antler India invested alongside other global institutional investors like Arkam Ventures from India, Picus Capital, M Venture Partners, BECO Capital and 2am VC.

Maheshwari quit Twitter to start the ed-tech company in December. In August last year, Twitter had said Maheshwari was moving to the US as Senior Director (Revenue Strategy and Operations) and focus on new markets in his new role. It had not specified any reason for the sudden change.

This was after Twitter had faced flak for its various actions taken on tweets and accounts of high-profile users. In June, an FIR was registered against Maheshwari and some others in connection with a probe related to a video of an alleged hate crime that went viral on social media. Before joining Twitter, Maheshwari was the CEO of Network18 Digital. He has also worked with organisations including Flipkart and P&G, among others.

He said, “Metaverse is a concept that stands at a cusp where it will be a lead factor in transforming the educational landscape. We will use this investment to bolster the product and technology team for the Metaversity platform, build a virtual-first curriculum and expand into Europe and the US.”

In parallel, the startup has also raised capital from more than 70 angel investors such as Balaji Srinivasan (former CTO of Coinbase and GP at Andreessen Horowitz), Caesar Sengupta (former VP and General Manager of Payments & the Next Billion Users initiative at Google), Nithin Kamath (founder, Zerodha), Kunal Bahl (founder, Snapdeal) and others.

"I've always believed that education, rather than being a privilege, should be a right. Our vision at Metaversity is not only to democratize education but also to provide high-quality learning at an affordable cost. I am grateful that such well-known names are helping us on our journey", said Tanay Pratap, Founder and CTO of the company.

Invact Metaversity aims to make education more accessible and inclusive, providing the real-time experience of attending a university in a virtual world. With emphasis on creating a social and community layer, the platform is built to help give students a real university feel in the virtual world like entering a classroom, hanging out with peers at the campus, and more

“We are excited to be one of the first believers in Manish and Tanay’s vision. We believe it is time for a new generation of edtech platforms built in India for the world, and especially ones that will offer life-altering outcomes through upskilling and premium employability with a superior pedagogical approach”, said Nitin Sharma, pPartner and co-founder at Antler India.