Manipal Global Education forays into edtech, plans Rs 100 cr investments

Manipal Global Education has entered into the edtech space with the launch of Manipal MedAce in which the organisation plans to initially invest over Rs 100 crore in the development of content for the platform, a senior official of the said on Thursday.

Manipal Global Education Services (MaGE), Managing Director and CEO, Ravi Panchanadan told PTI that the institution is leveraging its expertise and resources for the foray in the edtech sector starting with learning modules for medical courses and test preparation for medical aspirants.

"With MedAce we've combined our 60-year expertise in delivering top tier medical content using the latest digital technology in a user-friendly manner," Panchanadan said.

The Manipal MedAce app will have learning modules for MBBS students and test preparation modules for NEET PG aspirants.

He said that Manipal has invested Rs 50-60 crore initially in the development of the MedAce and the company estimates investments of another Rs 50 crore over a period of next 15 months in the development of the platform.

Panchanadan said that there is no constraint on investments in development of the platform but MaGE will focus more on creating value instead of running for valuation.

"If I see the product going well for the next year, then the investment is not an issue, for Manipal to get private equity stakeholders to come in for investments. I am currently looking at investment in content, platform and engineering and technology as we speak," he said.

MaGE at present has about 90,000 to 95,000 students who join MBBS, which Panchanadan estimates will reach around 1,25,000 in the next one or two years and there will be paucity of good learning tools.

"With MedAce, we thought of something where those students would like to engage and learn better. That is the 'Learn' part of the product. This would clearly fit with the first and second year MBBS graduates and clear their concepts before they came into clinical practice," Panchanadan said.

He said that the learning modules will not provide any kind of certificate to students but will only provide them learning support beyond classrooms.

MedAce will focus on medical content in the first 15 months and then the institution will take a call on expanding it further for non-medical streams as well, he said.