BENGALURU: Education technology firm Vedantu has raised $100 million in Series D funding, led by US-based Coatue Management.
Existing investors Tiger Global, GGV Capital, Omidyar and Westbridge Capital also participated in the fundraising. The latest capital raising values the online live tutoring startup at $600 million, making it the second most valued Indian educational technology startup after Byju’s.
The deal also marks the latest bet for a large foreign investor in India’s fast-growing ed-tech space. ET was the first to report on June 30 that Coatue would lead a $100 million funding round in Vedantu.
This came just days after Silicon Valley investor and analyst Mary Meeker’s Bond Capital invested in rival Byju’s at a $10.5-billion valuation. Vedantu has said it registered a 220% growth in users to 2 million unique students who attended its live classes during the past three months.
Rahul Kishore, MD of Coatue Management, will join Vedantu’s board of directors. “Strong growth and category leadership of Vedantu in live online tutoring — these were the main reasons for us to gain investor interest,” said Vamsi Krishna, CEO of Vedantu. “It was a good opportunity to raise more money and create a war chest.”
The company will invest in its brand and new categories of Grade 1-5 education, using the proceeds from the latest round. The money from Coatue marks the third investment round in Vedantu in the last 12 months, after it raised $24 million led by GGV Capital in February, which was an extension of the company’s Series-C round that had seen Tiger Global lead an investment of $42 million. Vedantu said it had cumulatively raised $200 million across multiple funding rounds.
Coatue has backed some of the most highly valued startups across the world, such as Uber, Meituan Dianping and DoorDash. In India, the firm has made investments in online food ordering platform Swiggy and new-age restaurant brand Rebel Foods.
“Online learning adoption in India is at an all-time high, setting a new benchmark for the rest of the world,” Coatue’s Kishore said in a statement.
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