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Unacademy co-founders may step back, refocus on new edtech venture Airlearn

Unacademy's top brass is preparing for a leadership reshuffle, with co-founders Gaurav Munjal and Roman Saini expected to step back from day-to-day operations in the coming two to three months, according to people familiar with the matter. The pair is reportedly engaged in high-level talks with the company's board and key investors to carve out Airlearn—the edtech firm's language learning platform—into an independent entity. The third co-founder, Hemesh Singh, stepped down in June 2024. The trio had originally launched Unacademy nearly a decade ago, starting out as a YouTube channel before evolving into one of India's leading edtech platforms. Sumit Jain, founder of Graphy and elevated to partner at Unacademy following Hemesh Singh's departure last year, is poised to take charge of the company's offline operations, according to people familiar with the transition. At the same time, Unacademy is in the final stages of appointing new leadership to oversee its core online education business, according to the sources. An email query to Unacademy remained unanswered till press time. Jain joined Unacademy in 2020 following the acquisition of his startup Opentalk. In 2023, Unacademy promoted Jain, head of its Graphy division, to the role of partner—a designation internally likened to a late-stage co-founder. Jain co-founded Graphy, a platform that enables educators and content creators to build and sell their own online courses. Before his tenure at Unacademy, Jain co-founded real estate portal CommonFloor in 2007 and served as its chief executive officer. It was later acquired by classifieds platform Quikr in 2016. Notably, CommonFloor had earlier acquired an accommodation platform founded by Unacademy's Gaurav Munjal, in 2015. specialised in helping students and young professionals find housing in new cities. Munjal and Saini plan to devote their efforts to scaling Airlearn, Unacademy's language learning venture, which positions itself as a competitor to Duolingo, according to the sources. As of April, the app had attracted 70,000 daily active users and nearly 300,000 monthly users, according to a company update shared by Munjal on social media. Of those, 17,500 are paying subscribers, contributing to an annual recurring revenue of $2 million. The majority of Airlearn's user base hails from the US, UK, and Germany. Over the past year, users have completed more than 20 million lessons on the platform. The app currently offers 13 language courses, with English-to-Spanish, English-to-French, and English-to-Korean emerging as the most in demand. Unacademy's board includes representatives from global investors SoftBank and General Atlantic, as well as prominent entrepreneurs Bhavin Turakhia of Zeta and Sujeet Kumar of Udaan, alongside co-founders Gaurav Munjal and Roman Saini. The edtech company has secured approximately $880 million in total funding, according to data provider Tracxn. In 2021, it raised $440 million in a funding round led by Temasek, with super pro-rata participation from General Atlantic, Tiger Global, and SoftBank Vision Fund, taking the company's valuation to $3.44 billion. The three original co-founders collectively retain a roughly 15 per cent stake in the company. Unacademy recorded Rs 988.4 crore in total revenue during FY24, a 5.33 per cent decline compared to Rs 1,044 crore in FY23, according to Entrackr. However, the SoftBank-backed firm cut its losses by 62 per cent, reducing them to Rs 631 crore in the fiscal year ending March 2024 from Rs 1,678 crore in FY23. Munjal recently claimed that Unacademy has reduced its cash burn in the core business from over Rs 1,000 crore annually three years ago to under Rs 200 crore this calendar year. He added that Unacademy has Rs 1,200 crore in the bank and is financially stable. Some of its businesses, like Graphy and PrepLadder, are making money every month.