Byju's takes over struggling TutorVista and Edurite from Pearson

To beef up its global foray, ed-tech major Byju's has acquired global education company Pearson Plc’s TutorVista and Edurite for an undisclosed amount.

Pearson PLC acquired TutorVista from its founders K. Ganesh and his wife Meena in 2011 for $127 million.

The London based company has reportedly been trying to exit from TutorVista from quite some time. Back in 2011, the deal had made news for being one of the biggest exits by an Indian education tech company. However, Pearson appears to have exited from TutorVista with a massive haircut.

Industry sources told Entrackr that acquisition materialised in less than $3 million.

“This partnership will enhance our product offerings and give us access in some of the new markets when we launch our international products. We are excited to work with the talented and experienced team who will come onboard as a part of this acquisition,” Byju Raveendran, founder and chief executive at Byju’s said in a statement.

TutorVista provides online tutoring to students across the world. Besides online tutoring, it also offers test preparation services, help with homework and supplemental tutoring including expert assistance before tests and exams.

Pearson in 2009 acquired a 17 per cent stake in TutorVista. Later in January 2011, it purchased another 59 per cent stake for Rs 577 crore. Finally in February 2013, Pearson took over complete control on TutorVista.

Currently, Byju's has about 8 million users and 400K annual paid subscribers. It offers learning programmes for class 4-12 & test preparation for JEE, AIPMT, CAT, IAS, GRE & GMAT.

So far, Byju's is the poster boy of Indian ed-tech startup and had raised vast amount of funding from the likes of Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (founded by Mark Zuckerberg and Dr. Priscilla Chan), Sequoia Capital and Sofina and others.

Till now, the company raised about $170 million total funding including $30 million from Brussels-based family office Verlinvest in March this year.

Recently, Byju's expanded to the Middle East and trying to go deeper in tier II and III cities in India. The company has registered a revenue growth of Rs 120 crore in 2015-2016 from Rs 4 crore in 2011-2012.

“Edurite and TutorVista are pioneer brands in their respective spaces and enjoy great customer goodwill. We are pleased that a leading online education company in India sees value in the Edurite and TutorVista businesses, brands and employees,” added, Deepak Mehrotra, managing director at Pearson India.

Byju's competes with Edureka, Onlinetyari, Simplilearn, Meritnation including several others.