upGrad appoints Myleeta AgaWilliams as chief executive officer of international operations

Edtech unicorn upGrad, on August 17, announced the appointment of Myleeta AgaWilliams as the chief executive officer (CEO) - of its international business. The company said AgaWilliams will spearhead growth across the Asia-Pacific, Europe, Middle East, Africa, and the United States regions.

This development comes at the back of upGrad co-founder and managing director, Mayank Kumar’s remarks on the company’s efforts on doubling down growth in its international operations, in a recent interview with Moneycontrol.

The company in a statement said that with over two decades of experience in global and digital businesses, AgaWilliams will be responsible for managing end-to-end international operations and creating region-specific product pipelines.

In her new role, AgaWilliams will also engage with managerial teams based in multiple geographies, to align short-term and long-term business objectives for accelerating profitability, added the company.

"While we are leading the higher education space in India and have penetrated successfully across South East Asia, we felt it's the right time we go aggressive with other geographies which will require strategic linear and non-linear movements to support the growth. Myleeta, who has built and scaled operations across niche markets including Asia will continue to accelerate our ambition of becoming a global leader within the LifeLongLearning segment," said Kumar.

upGrad said AgaWilliams will assume office in August to accelerate expansion plans. According to upGrad, AgaWilliams has previously managed diverse product portfolios and led marketing and sales teams across geographies at Netflix, BBC Studios, Discovery, and UTV amongst others.

"In this next stage of growth, we will be looking at each of the markets in which we have ambitions to achieve scale and apply a nuanced and focussed strategy, leveraging my past experience and deep knowledge of digital consumption habits. I am thrilled to be joining Ronnie, Mayank, Phalgun, and the leadership team at this exciting phase of high growth," said AgaWilliams.

In a recent episode of CNN-News18’s Bits to Billions, Kumar also said that Phalgun Kompalli, another co-founder of the company will be looking after the company’s growth in international geographies and has shifted base to the United States in line with the same.

Kumar founded UpGrad in 2015 with media maven Ronnie Screwvala and Phalgun Kompalli to offer short courses on entrepreneurship and data science.

The Mumbai-based company spans several segments, from test prep to studying abroad, and undergrad degrees to campus courses in 250 universities. Its offerings include finance, law, business, and software for the 18-60 age group.

On June 16, the company doubled its valuation after raising $225 million in fresh funding, balking at a frosty global venture capital environment.

The company increased its valuation to $2.25 billion in the round that included billionaire James Murdoch’s Lupa Systems LLC and US testing and assessment provider Educational Testing Service.

The founders combined own about 55 percent of the equity.

upGrad has been on a spree acquiring about 13 companies with Exampur, Harappa Education, and Wolves India being some of the latest on the list.