Kris Gopalakrishnan invests in edutech start-up Avagmah

Firm provides tech platform to universities on a managed services model and helps them with digital marketing

Bengaluru-based education technology start-up Avagmah has raised an undisclosed amount from S Gopalakrishnan, co-founder and former CEO of Infosys and Atul Nishar, founder of Aptech.

Avagmah, which was founded in 2013 and focuses on helping universities of higher education deliver courses online, is already operationally profitable.

Having secured a funding of $5 million in the last 18 months, the company has grown its business by eight times.

"The current brick and mortar higher education system is facing major challenges of excellence and access, with only 24 million students enrolled out of the potential 120 million. Universities and top tier institutions have to adopt technology to provide access to quality education to millions," said S Gopalakrishnan, former Infosys CEO, in a statement.

The firm provides its tech platform to universities on a managed services model and also helps them with digital marketing. It so far has partnered with three universities - Pondicherry University, Bharathidasan University and Los Angeles-based UCLA Extension. Going forward Avagmah plans to utilise the capital to enhance its tech platform and acquire more customers.

Targeting a base of working professionals who cannot quit their jobs to enroll in higher studies and students in smaller towns that lack access to great universities, Avagmah helps partner universities deliver courses through mobile apps and the web. The company claims 45 per cent of students who are enrolled in courses through its tech platform are from Tier 2 and 3 cities.

"We are satisfied with the success in the initial phase, with one of the university clients reporting 200 per cent growth in student enrollment in 12 months which reached itself to a much larger audience using Avagmah's technology and services," said Karthik KS, founder and CEO of Avagmah.