Missing $533 million was "roundtripped" back to Byju Raveendran, affiliates: alleges Delaware court filing; Byju's denies allegations

The filing comes as BYJU’s Alpha seeks approval of a settlement with OCI Limited, the UK-based procurement company that received most of the disputed money

A new filing in the Delaware Bankruptcy Court in USA has claimed that the missing $533 million from Byju's Alpha, an entity now controlled by Byju’s term loan B lenders, was “in effect, roundtripped right back to Byju Raveendran and his affiliates.”

Founders of Think & Learn (Byju's parent company) have rejected the allegations in a media statement issued on November 17.

The filing comes as Byju’s Alpha seeks approval of a settlement with OCI Limited, the UK-based procurement company that received most of the disputed money. As part of the settlement, OCI’s founder Oliver Chapman submitted a sworn declaration that “itemises down to the cent what happened to the Alpha Funds, once OCI received the money.”

The filing claims that the Alpha Funds was not used for “legitimate commercial purposes,” nor was the money used by OCI to procure goods and services, such as tablets and advertising, for Think & Learn.

“In an unsolicited, sworn declaration filed with the Court in the fall of 2024, Raveendran repeatedly represented that the money actually had been sent to OCI for “legitimate commercial purposes,” namely, to procure “services to T&L and its subsidiaries in relation to the procurement of IT equipment, such as electronic tablets, and advertising (including marketing via various media),” the filing said.

The filing added that Chapman’s review showed that, in 2022, “$533 million was clandestinely removed, with the intention that the vast majority of that money be moved (via a series of opaque transfers) to a corporate vehicle in Singapore—Byju’s Global Pte Ltd—that Raveendran individually owned.”

The court filing claimed that this was evidence of personal enrichment.

“Chapman’s credible declaration, in other words, demonstrates that Raveendran’s plot was to siphon hundreds of millions of dollars of corporate assets for personal use,” the filing said.

Byju's Denies Allegations

In their media statement, the founders of Byju's said that they categorically and unequivocally reject the allegations made in GLAS Trust’s latest filing in the Delaware proceedings, which relies heavily on a selective and incomplete declaration submitted by Mr. Oliver Chapman, CEO of OCI Limited.

"Mr. Chapman’s testimony is full of conjectures and selective insinuations and does not substantiate any claim of wrongdoing by the founders of BYJU’S. At most, his declaration reflects his limited knowledge of specific expenditures undertaken by OCI; it does not establish any diversion of funds by the founders," the statement said.

"The facts remain unchanged: No portion of the USD 533 million in question has been used by founders directly or indirectly. The said amount has been used in its entirety for the benefit of Think and learn as evidenced in documents and bank statements," it added.

Our forthcoming filing will provide the Court with evidence rebutting each of the assertions made in the recent GLAS Trust submission, they said.

"GLAS Trust and the Resolution Professional (RP) have full access to the complete financial records, bank statements, and underlying documentation of Think & Learn Private Ltd. (TLPL) and its US subsidiaries. They are therefore fully aware of the legitimate commercial utilisation of these funds. Despite this, they continue to place before the Court and the public only partial/selective extracts, stripped of context, in order to create a misleading and prejudicial narrative. When the full money trail is available with them, presenting only half-truths is not an accident — it is a deliberate strategy to sabotage the founders’ reputation," the statement further added.

Byju’s saga

Byju’s dramatic fall from being one of the world’s most valuable edtech startups to facing insolvency proceedings across jurisdictions is rooted in a series of financial, legal and operational crises that began soon after its aggressive global expansion.

In November 2021, the company raised a massive $1.2 billion Term Loan B through its US financing vehicle, Byju’s Alpha. The money was intended to fuel large international acquisitions and rapid scaling, but by mid-2023, lenders alleged major breaches of the credit agreement and claimed that roughly $500 million was missing from Byju’s Alpha.

US lenders moved through the courts to enforce their rights under the loan agreement, and, in November 2023, the Delaware court ruled in favour of the lenders’ bid to take control of Byju’s Alpha.

While the US battle played out, the company faced rising financial pressure at home. On June 16, 2024, India’s cricket board, the BCCI, filed an insolvency petition over unpaid sponsorship dues of Rs 158 crore, triggering the corporate insolvency resolution process under India’s Insolvency and Bankruptcy Code.

Moneycontrol reported on November 15 that Ronnie Screwvala–run UpGrad has submitted a bid for Byju’s parent company Think & Learn, becoming the second known participant in the ongoing insolvency process after Ranjan Pai's Manipal Education and Medical Group.