Page 15 - Edtech

Byju's top executive Cherian Thomas quits, joins Impending Inc as CEO

Thomas played an integral part in setting up the US operations at edtech giant Byju's and was also responsible for spearheading the business of Byju's owned educational gaming firm Osmo as its CEO

Unacademy's sacked teacher says firm acted under social media pressure

Unacademy sacked teacher Karan Sangwan on Saturday alleged that the firm terminated his service under pressure from trollers on social media who misinterpreted his generic remark to vote for educated candidates. In a video on his YouTube channel, Sangwan said he made the generic remark on his YouTube channel and not during his lecture at Unacademy. "Why did termination happen? There is a pressure which gets built and you burst under its load. You (Unacademy) could not deal with the pressure. Therefore, under pressure you had to take an action which you may have not desired to or you desired to...I don't know. I can't say anything about what your intentions were?" Sangwan said. Sangwan said that Unacademy acted against him without hearing him out. "You directly sent me a termination notice," Sangwan said, adding that to hide the pressure, Unacademy used the term "code of conduct" without defining a political statement. He said that Unacademy cited views expressed by a Twitter accou

In fresh round of layoffs, edtech giant Byju's lets go of 100 employees

His appointment coincides with a difficult period for Byju's, once heralded as the most valuable edtech company but now making headlines for the wrong reasons

Andhra Pradesh, edX join together to make students globally ready

The Andhra Pradesh government and edX, a leading e-learning platform have entered into an agreement to evolve a roadmap for bolstering existing varsity courses to propel state students to be globally ready by learning modern technologies. edX will collaborate with AP higher education department (HED) to create a roadmap for enhancing its online courses designed by top global institutions such as MIT, Harvard, Oxford, Cambridge and other universities. edX representatives met Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy at his camp office today. "edX may work with Andhra Pradesh HED to explore training and learning needs, identify learning gaps and curate MOOCs (massive open online courses) from within edX's existing online campus subscription catalogue with respect to the requirement of the current curriculum of both professional and conventional degree programmes," said an official press release. Both the entities are expected to jointly launch technologies and pedagogies for teaching and

Physics Wallah to cross Rs 2,400 cr in revenue in FY24, says co-founder

Where Byju's acquisitions were indiscriminate, PW's are measured, says co-founder

Anurag Tiwari appointed as National Academic Director for Unacademy Centres

Learning plarform Unacademy on Friday announced the appointment of Anurag Tiwari as the National Academic Director for Unacademy Centres. Prior to joining Unacademy, Tiwari served as the National Academic Director at Aakash Educational Services Ltd for 13 years. "An accomplished educator with over 18 years of experience in the education sector, Anurag brings a wealth of expertise and a proven track record to his new role," Unacademy said in a release. Founded by Gaurav Munjal, Hemesh Singh, and Roman Saini in 2015, Unacademy is a learning platform with a growing network of 91,000-plus registered educators and over 99 million learners. Unacademy Group comprises Unacademy, Graphy, UnacademyX, NextLevel, and Prepladder. "We are certain that his presence will further amplify our dedication to providing high-quality education to all learners and ensure we make a lasting impact on the educational landscape," Unacademy co-founder and CEO Gaurav Munjal said.

Hiring for fresh talent rises 3% in HY23, shows job market optimism: Study

Hiring intent for all categories of jobseekers increased to 73%: TeamLease

Byju's lenders accused of using bogus loan-default claims to gain control

The distressed-debt lenders are "playing hardball" to create leverage in negotiations to restructure the loan and causing problems for Byju's executives

Byju's misses August 3 deadline to rework $1.2 billion loan terms

Byju's said no deadline had been missed as "August 3 was merely a hopeful date that was likely to be scheduled for a sign off"

Byju's Aakash unit forced to rework board after breaching loan agreement

Davidson Kempner, which manages more than $38 billion, forced the changes in Aaksah's board as the borrower was in breach of some covenants on a $250 million loan

Troubled Byju's misses target to amend its $1.2 billion loan terms

The company failed to decide on revisions sought by lenders in the loan's terms, including part repayment and higher interest payment

As startups lay off staff to cut costs, employees head out for job hunt

Employees not just from edtech but also from commerce and digital media startups are looking out for new jobs amidst massive layoffs

Education ministry selects Oracle Cloud Infrastructure to modernise DIKSHA

The Ministry of Education has selected Oracle Cloud Infrastructure to modernise national education technology platform Digital Infrastructure for Knowledge Sharing (DIKSHA), the company said on Wednesday. The migration will help make DIKSHA more accessible and lower its IT costs. The platform supports 1.48 million schools across 35 states and Union Territories and is available in 36 Indian languages. "We have transformed and migrated DIKSHA onto Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI)," said Shailender Kumar, senior vice-president and regional managing director, Oracle India and NetSuite Asia Pacific and Japan, at a briefing. Under the seven-year collaboration pact, OCI will help the ministry use DIKSHA to provide educational resources to millions of additional students, teachers and collaborators across the country. DIKSHA was built for school education and foundational learning programmes and represents one of India's largest and most successful Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) ...

Top headlines: Fitch cuts US credit rating, corporation tax mop-up slips

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upGrad announces advisory board to scale upGrad Institute in Singapore

Edtech firm upGrad on Monday announced the appointment of seven industry leaders to the advisory board of upGrad Institute, a government-approved private education institution in Singapore. The advisory board will offer insights to help accelerate upGrad's focus on building a robust learning institute that will empower the global workforce with an industry-ready experiential curriculum, the company said in a statement. "Joining the advisory board as Chairman, Prof. Arnoud De Meyer, ex-president of Singapore Management University... Along with him, Prof S Sadagopan, chairman, BoG, IIITDM-Kancheepuram, and founder director, IIIT-Bangalore, brings extensive experience in academia and education," the company said. With a sharp focus on skilling and job outcomes, upGrad Institute has also on-boarded accomplished industry leaders from diverse backgrounds, it said. They include Magdalene Ew, head of content, entertainment, Southeast Asia, Taiwan and Hong Kong, Warner Bros. Discovery; Jere

Top headlines: Foxconn in talks for $200 mn plant in TN, Fed hikes rates

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For edtech firm Byju's chaotic situation, are only founders to be blamed?

Byju's delayed giving its FY21 financial report by 18 months and when it did, it reported a loss of Rs 4,570 crore. The FY22 financials are yet to be filed

Will 'significantly' mark down Byju's valuation: Peak XV Partners

This is the first time investors have externally flagged financial and corporate irregularities at the edtech firm

Star founder Raveendran broke down in tears as crises engulfed Byju's

Without easy access to global capital, companies are now facing greater scrutiny over corporate governance, jeopardizing India's quest to pull even with the US and China as a tech capital of the world

Byju's 'regularly disregarded' former director's advice, says Prosus

Prosus, which this year slashed its valuation of Byju's to $5.1 billion from $22 billion last year, said the decision for its director to step down from Byju's board last month