WhiteHat Jr CEO Ananya Tripathi resigns, in another top level exit at Byju's

Tripathi joined WhiteHat Jr in April of last year. She was the Managing Director at KKR Capstone before joining WhiteHat Jr. A McKinsey alumni, Tripathi also served as the Chief Strategy Officer of Myntra for almost four years.

Byju’s acquired WhiteHat Jr, a code-learning platform, in August 2020, in a whopping $300 million cash deal. The deal had given Karan Bajaj, the founder of WhiteHat Jr, one of the biggest exits ever in India’s startup ecosystem.

Bajaj continued to serve as the CEO of WhiteHat Jr but resigned in August 2021, exactly a year after the company was acquired. Trupti Mukker, a Byju’s executive, had been appointed as the CEO of WhiteHat Jr before Tripathi took charge.

Tripathi has joined a growing list of senior executives to leave the world’s most valued edtech startup, which is currently grappling with myriad challenges. Earlier this week, Moneycontrol reported that three more senior executives, including Byju’s Chief Business Officer Prathyusha Agarwal, quit the company.

WhiteHat Jr's challenges

In 2020, WhiteHat Jr faced significant criticism due to its aggressive sales strategies. The company had then launched a campaign featuring a fictitious 12-year-old named Wolf Gupta. The campaign depicted Wolf Gupta securing a job worth Rs 1.2 crore at Google after mastering artificial intelligence (AI) through WhiteHat Jr's programmes.

Additionally, it was reported that WhiteHat Jr disregarded the guidelines set forth by the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI). The company was accused of making questionable and unsupported claims, according to an article in The News Minute.

While WhiteHat Jr had withdrawn the Wolf-Gupta campaign, it continued spending heavily on customer acquisition costs. According to Byju’s FY21 results, WhiteHat Jr contributed Rs 326.66 crore of total revenue and a loss of Rs 1,548.76 crore to the loss before tax from operations of the company.

To be sure, Byju Raveendran, co-founder and CEO of Byju’s, in his media interactions has been pretty vocal about how WhiteHat Jr is the company’s only acquisition that has struggled. In an interview with Moneycontrol in January this year, Raveendran said, “WhiteHat Jr has been a challenge on the cost side. Solving its customer acquisition cost is the only business challenge we have.”

“Most of our core businesses are already at break-even or profitable. We are burning cash only in WhiteHat Jr,” he had said.

Earlier this year, a Tech Crunch report also suggested that Byju’s discussed shutting down WhiteHat Jr due to its high burn and struggles with the product market fit.

Byju’s woes

The four senior-level exits, including Tripathi’s, have come at a time when Byju's has been facing a range of challenges on both domestic and international fronts. In June, Byju's encountered a significant setback as three crucial investor board members decided to step down due to disagreements with the founder, Byju Raveendran. These disagreements primarily revolved around operational matters.

Adding to this, Byju's long-standing auditor, Deloitte, who had been associated with the company since 2015, also resigned in June. The reason cited for this resignation was the delay in releasing the financial results for the fiscal year 2021-22.

Simultaneously, Byju's is currently engaged in discussions with creditors, including Term Loan B lenders and Davidson Kempner. The company is eagerly awaiting an infusion of funds that holds paramount importance in helping it navigate an impending liquidity crisis.

In an effort to address its challenges, Byju's has made significant organisational changes. This includes a workforce reduction of more than 2,000 employees throughout the year, shifting a majority to a contractual basis and relinquishing its largest office space in Bengaluru.

Byju's has come under scrutiny due to dissatisfaction from both students and parents. Moneycontrol previously reported that more than 60 percent  of Byju's Tuition Tuition Centre (BTC) customers requested refunds within the last two years.

However, Byju's has been taking steps to reverse the situation over the past three months. It introduced a board advisory council, with the inclusion of industry veterans such as TV Mohandas Pai and Rajnish Kumar as advisors. In addition, Byju's has recently appointed Richard Lobo to lead its human resources department. Lobo is expected to assume his role in September.

Byju’s, in March 2022, Byju's secured a massive $800 million in funding, propelling its valuation to over $22 billion. Byju's, conceptualised by former educator Raveendran more than a decade ago, has effectively raised nearly $6 billion in funding over its operational history.