Edtech

As Unacademy shifts offline, is Gaurav Munjal shifting focus?

Nikhil Patwardhan

September 24, 2024 | 13 Min Read

Going offline was never part of Gaurav Munjal’s vision for Unacademy. With the business going increasingly offline in recent years, however, Munjal’s focus appears to be shifting from the company’s core business to its latest venture—Unacademy Languages.

Key Takeaways

One of India’s best funded ventures, SoftBank-backed Unacademy has been trying to script a turnaround for over a year but hasn’t made much progress
With its investors pushing for an acquisition, the company has explored several merger options but with little success
The majority of Unacademy’s senior management has quit. Even its co-founder and CEO Gaurav Munjal appears to have lost interest in the core business
For Munjal, the focus now seems to be on Unacademy Languages, a competitor to Duolingo, which he believes has the potential to become Unacademy’s first “global offering”

As 2023 came to a close, Gaurav Munjal, co-founder and CEO of Unacademy—one of India's most heavily funded ventures—shared an update with his employees on Slack. He claimed Unacademy was cash flow-positive in the April-June quarter of 2023 and had successfully reduced its burn rate by 60% compared to the previous year.

Munjal also mentioned that the company held approximately Rs 1,800 crore in cash reserves, providing it with a financial runway of at least four years, which could lengthen as overheads continued to decrease.

The message sought to alleviate employees’ concerns about Unacademy’s future after a year marked by significant senior management exits and cost-cutting measures, including laying off thousands of employees. Despite being an internal communication, it received widespread media coverage.

"It was all about shaping perception. His tweets about his learnings, the stories circulating in the media, and his attempts to rally support from the startup ecosystem were all aimed at crafting a strong narrative," said someone closely associated with Unacademy.

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