Vedantu joins Byju's, Unacademy, PhysicsWallah to open offline centre

From L to R Anand Prakash Pulkit Jain and Vamsi Krishna- Vedantu founders

Tiger Global-backed edtech unicorn Vedantu has joined a growing list of online education companies, such as Byju's, Unacademy and Physicswallah, that are opening offline tuition centres.

In  a statement on June 30, Vedantu said that it opened its first hybrid learning cente branded as 'Vedantu Learning Center' in Muzaffarpur. The centre will offer IIT-JEE and NEET preparation courses to students of Grade 11th and a one-year course for dropper batch, the company said.

Vedantu said its hybrid learning center will offer students from tier-3 and tier-4 cities access to top teachers from across the country.

"Exams such as JEE and NEET are high-stakes exams and after speaking with so many parents over the years, we understand that these competitive exams require dedicated supervision & personalized attention, and our current hybrid model facilitates this for students in tier 3 and tier 4 cities," said Vamsi Krishna, co-founder and chief executive officer of Vedantu said.

"Keeping this in mind and our mission to create 'Impact at Scale', we are proud to launch our first of many hybrid Vedantu Learning Centers where we ensure quality learning for every student," Krishna added.

As of today, 6 percent of IIT batch 2022- 2026 are Vedantu students, the edtech company claimed. Over 1,500 Vedantu students aced JEE advanced 2021 making the selection ratio 12.5 percent, which is 3X higher than the national average of 3.5 percent, the edtech unicorn said.

The offline classrooms will provide hi-tech interactive applications such as immersive 3-D content, and students will be able to get their doubts solved live, Vedantu said.

The learning centres will also offer interactive quizzes to students, the company said. The company's 'Master Teachers' will be live and teaching remotely, but the classes will be supervised by a class teacher present physically to coordinate and monitor students' progress, Vedantu said.

Students will be divided into a batch of twenty-five per class to ensure every child gets personalized attention by India’s Master Teachers. Every student will be provided their personal Wi-Fi and 4G enabled tablet, to interact in class and study at home, the company said.

Students will also have access to more than 1,500 Tatva Smart books, Vedantu said.

Last week, Moneycontrol reported that the edtech company, which got valued at over a billion dollars in September last year, reported a fourfold increase in expenses to Rs 744 crore for FY21 from Rs 186 crore a year earlier, as employee benefit expenses rose to Rs 408 crore in FY21 from Rs 88 crore in FY20. 

In May, Vedantu had laid off about 624 employees or about 10 percent of its workforce, in a bid to reduce expenses and focus on profitability. The company is also aiming look to acheive a 25 percent profit margin within the next 18 months and will also look to float an IPO (initial public offering).

Vedantu, founded in 2011 by three IIT graduates, Krishna, Anand Prakash and Pulkit Jain, provides an online tutoring platform for K-12 (Kindergarten to class 12) students. The company also has a learning platform for medical and engineering entrance tests like IIT-JEE and NEET.