India's higher education system is the third largest in the world, next to the United States and China. It has expanded at a fast pace by adding nearly 20,000 colleges and more than 8 million students in a decade from 2000-01 to 2010-11. India has more than 42 central universities, 275 state universities, 130 deemed universities and 90 private universities. Other institutions include 33,000 colleges as Government Degree Colleges and Private Degree Colleges, including 1800 exclusive women's colleges, functioning under these universities and institutions. Also the literacy rate of India has grown by more than 62% since independence. With this exponentially rising sector of education, places like Kota and Hyderabad are already witnessing a massive number of students. And further, education sector is seen as a potential rising segment by our start-ups too that can provide online classes, pre-recorded videos and curated contents and they are transforming the way education is delivered in India.
Let us know a few startups that are doing wonders in Education Technology :
1) EmbibeIt is an online portal that consists of a team of entrepreneurs, who help students to get coaching for various entrance examinations like JEE, AIIMS, AIPMT, CET and many more. It was founded by an ex-TCS employee, 33-year-old Aditi Avasthi who wanted to change the way students prepared for competitive exams.
At present, Embibe boasts of over one million student users. Last year, this edtech venture raised $4 million from early-stage investor such as Kalaari Capital and Lightbox.
2) VedantuIt delivers personalised teaching while you sit at home. Vedantu, the live online tutoring edutech company, is conceptualized to bring personalization back into education where a teacher will teach according to the requirement, pace and level of a student and the student will interact with the teacher online.
The founders claimed the existing teaching system to be "institutionalized and generalized", which quite possibly was the motivation behind this concept.
Vedantu raised a $5 million from Accel Partners and Tiger Global Management last year in May.
3) EduKartEduKart is an online entrance coaching site that caters to the needs of almost every individual. Apart from courses for high school students appearing for various competitive examinations, the company offers undergraduate and post graduate courses for everyone who seeks help in management, engineering, medical, civil services, business, Law, and various other interesting courses.The startup acquired $1 million funding from Holostik Group's United Finsec, Yuvraj Singh's YouWeCan Ventures, 500 Startups, and a bunch of other investors in June '15. EduKart projected 5 x growths for them last year.
4) TopprStarted in the year 2013 by founders Hemanth Goteti and Zishana Hayath, it is an online subject-learning platform changing the way students prepare for IIT JEE, AIPMT, and Boards in India. Students can take unlimited tests, get feedback reports and compare rankings. It is the one stop solution as students get to focus on improving their performance with the question banks, unlimited tests with feedback, suggested practice tests, rank comparison, 24*7 supports and the mobile app of Toppr. It received a funding of $12 Million from SAIF, Helion and Fidelity Growth.
5)
UEducationUEducation started in 2015 by its founders Ravijot Chugh, Prabhav Phalgun, Ronnie Screwvala, and Mayank. The Company’s full stack approach of innovating in content, technology and service gives it an advantage over any other edtech ventures. The courseware is sourced from both academicians and industries. They are focusing on getting the industry participate in the curriculum and deliver the course. Courses will be co-branded in partnership with university whose faculty will be responsible for create the curriculum. It received a funding of $ 15 Million by Ronnie Screwvala.
Guest Author
This is Samrat Sharma. He lives in Delhi. He is a mechanical engineer and currently pursuing MBA. He has a work experience of two years as a production manager at JSW Steel Ltd. He loves to travel, sing, play synthesizer and write.
