upGrad eyes Rs 1,000 cr revenue in 2020-21

Online higher education platform upGrad on Monday said it is eyeing Rs 1,000 crore revenue in 2020-21, on the back of growing average revenue per user (ARPU).

"The last three years at upGrad, owing to our high investment in content, learning experience, diversity of programmes, deep tech, strong university alliances and a high over 80 per cent completion rates, have put us at a clear inflection point for this decade," upGrad Executive Chairman and co-founder Ronnie Screwvala said.

With growing ARPU, new programmes in data, digital, management, software, machine learning or artificial intelligence, upGrad is now offering jobs in over 300 cities across the country will contribute to high growth in the coming financial year, he said.

"upGrad targets to cross an annual revenue run rate of Rs 1,000 crore in 2020-21," he added.

upGrad, with an ARPU of close to Rs 2.4 lakh per learner, crossed 21,000 cumulative learners on their platform and looks to add 4,000 learners this quarter to end the financial year with an annualised run rate of Rs 400 crore.

He said India is one of the lowest ARPU countries in the world -- in media, telecom, content, retail and more.

"Brand affinities are very low and looking for the best or lowest price is the bedrock of the India consumption story. Education is and will be the exception and allocation of wallet share will increase for edTech, as most in the workforce play catch up in their careers with the innovations and disruptions of this century," Screwvala said.

Going forward, upGrad is planning to offer degree courses from the next financial year, he said.

"We are in talks with three universities for jointly developing curriculum for the degree courses," he added.