New Delhi: Online education start-up UpGrad has acquired job skilling platform Acadview Software Pvt Ltd. for an undisclosed sum, the company said in a statement on Monday.
UpGrad, promoted by entrepreneur Ronnie Screwvala, aims to extend its online learning platform to higher education at the undergraduate level through the acquisition.
Founded in early 2015, Acadview seeks to upskill recent graduates with in-demand technologies through online live courses and industry projects, enabling better employment opportunities. It claims to have trained more than 3,000 students in 2017.
“Upgrad’s highly engaging online learning solution along with Acadview’s solid presence within the college space in India will allows us to deploy learning solutions for college students on a massive scale,” said Screwvala and Mayank Kumar, co-founders of UpGrad, in a joint statement.
Gurugram-headquartered Acadview had raised an undisclosed amount of funding from angel investors from India and Silicon Valley. It has also partnered with over 80 universities and colleges in north India.
“Equipping students with engaging content, personalized coaching, hands-on experience with real world projects and guidance from subject matter experts in the industry can bring about a change in the quality of workforce available to employers. We believe in UpGrad’s vision and feel that we have found a perfect cultural fit for our mission, ” said Himanshu Batra, founder and chief executive officer of Acadview.
This marks Upgrad’s second acquisition in two years. In 2016, the company bought Pyoopil Education Technologies Pvt Ltd., a mobile based SaaS product used by companies to deploy online training programmes for employees.
Founded by Screwvala, Kumar, Phalgun Kompalli and Ravijot Chugh, UpGrad offers online courses in entrepreneurship, digital marketing and data analytics among others for working professionals.
UpGrad competes with foreign online education start-ups, including Coursera and Udacity, and home-grown ventures such as EduReka and Simplilearn.
Mint reported in October last year that UpGrad was also planning to enter foreign markets such as West Asia and South East Asia and had committed ₹300 crore to fund the overseas expansion. The corpus is three times more the amount it has invested in the Indian market.