Indian education startup Byju's first results in years revealed that losses at its parent company narrowed only marginally amid a pandemic-era boom in business, underscoring challenges for the firm embroiled in a dispute with creditors over a $1.2 billion loan.
The Bengaluru-based online tutoring firm's parent Think & Learn Pvt. posted a loss of 22.5 billion rupees ($271 million) at an operational level in the financial year ending March 2022, compared with a 24 billion rupees loss a year earlier, it said in an emailed statement. Total income for the firm more than doubled to 35.7 billion rupees.
The results underscore how Byju's - once the poster child for India's booming startup economy - is struggling to escape a post-Covid funk. Creditors sued Byju's this year after it breached covenants on a $1.2 billion loan. The standoff cast a spotlight on founder Byju Raveendran, whose meteoric rise from tutor to head of the country's most valuable tech startup wowed investors.
At its peak, Byju's spent heavily to meet surging pandemic-era demand for its services when schools and universities shut their doors. Once a sponsor of India's national cricket team, it bought several firms in the US and elsewhere and tried to expand globally.
But growth has slowed since classes resumed, and the company's challenges have been exacerbated by the months-long legal dispute that's only showing signs of intensifying.
Delays in submitting financial results drew scrutiny from regulators and led to the resignation of Deloitte Haskins & Sells as the company's auditor this year. In April, Indian plainclothes officials raided its Bengaluru offices, seizing laptops and publicly linking the world's most valuable education-technology startup with possible foreign exchange violations. Several US-based investors accused Byju's of hiding half a billion dollars, prompting lawsuits.
One of its main investors, Prosus NV, slashed the value of its holding in June in a move that pegged the startup's total valuation at $5.1 billion. As recently as last year, Byju's raised funds at a $22 billion valuation.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
Featured Video Of The Day
PM Modi Pays Tribute To Mahatma Gandhi In Guyana
Byju's Founder Accused Of Trying To Regain Firm With Hidden Cash Byju's US Units Wrongly Stripped Of Education App, Court Rules Top Court Reverses Tribunal Order On Byju's- BCCI Rs 158 Crore Settlement Amazon Employee Greets Friend At Wedding, Dies Of Cardiac Arrest "Speculative, Inaccurate": Canada Factchecks Own Media, Backtracks After India's Stinker Indian Student In US Accidentally Shoots Himself Dead While Celebrating Birthday Chimps Are Upping Their Tool Game. Why It Holds Relevance For Humans Nutritionist Reveals How High-AGEs Diets Are Fuelling Diabetes "This Is Worth...": Ex-Zomato Employee On Deepinder Goyal's Job Offer Track Latest News Live on NDTV.com and get news updates from India and around the world.