Byju’s in talks to acquire part of TutorVista from Pearson

Byju’s, the leading education-technology startup in India, is is in the final stage of talks to acquire a part of the online education company TutorVista. This includes the online business of technology-enabled education solutions provider Edurite. Edurite Technologies Pvt Ltd. was acquired by TutorVista in 2007.

TutorVista was founded by Krishnan Ganesh and Meena Ganesh in 2005. It started as an online tutoring company and then expanded its presence into the related areas across the ed-tech value chain. TutorVista provides digital content and technology platforms to schools. It also offers test preparation services and expert assistance services to students.

Pearson first acquired a 17% stake in TutorVista in 2009. Shortly after that, it purchased another 59% stake in January 2011 and consolidated its holding to 80% in a brief time. In 2014, it acquired the remaining 20% in TutorVista.

With this acquisition, Byju’s is targeting the US market. It already has strong presence in the Middle Eastern and Indian market. TutorVista acquisition will provide it significant headwind in the US market as US is TutorVista’s biggest market.

Byju’s was founded in 2011 as an offline tutoring business for test preparation has now transformed itself into a learning app offering learning solutions for K-12 students for everything from test prep classes to competitive exams. The app is used by eight million students, and has close to 400,000 paid annual subscriptions till date.

Byju’s has raised close to US$204 million till date as part of multiple funding rounds from investors including Sofina, Sequoia Capital, Lightspeed Ventures and Times Internet Ltd.