Uniphore is 🦄 now, Udaan's IPO plans📊, Byju's $200 Mn offline bet📚
Uniphore enters Unicorn Club, Udaan aims to go public by May 2023, Byju’s makes $200 mn bet on offline classes, Funding Deals & more.
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Uniphore enters Unicorn Club with $400 Mn Funding🦄
Uniphore Technologies Inc. entered the league of unicorns after the conversational automation platform raised $400 million at a valuation of $2.5 billion.
Uniphore, founded in 2008, raised funds in a Series E round led by American venture capital firm New Enterprise Associates (NEA). The latest round has swelled Uniphore’s total capital raised to $610 million so far. It last raised $140 million in March 2021.
The company plans to use the fresh funds to improve voice, artificial intelligence (AI), computer vision and tonal emotion, and to expand its business operations globally, specifically in North America, Europe and the Asia Pacific.
Founded by Umesh Sachdev and Ravi Saraogi, Uniphore is based out of Chennai and California and competes with companies such as ASAPP and Cogito.
Udaan aims to go public by May 2023, says CEO📊
Vaibhav Gupta, CEO of business-to-business (B2B) ecommerce firm Udaan told ET on Wednesday that the company aims to launch its initial public offering (IPO) by May 2023.
Gupta said he was fairly confident that Udaan would be ready for an IPO by the end of 2022 and that it had been improving its gross margins every quarter.
Since Udaan is a Singapore-headquartered company the company may look at listing abroad, though it is still deciding where to list.
Udaan also said on Wednesday that it would give stock options to all its 4,600 employees, and that they can now vest stocks every quarter, instead of having to wait at least a year.
Hot Shorts⚡
Healthtech startup Goqii has raised $50 million (Rs 375 crore) in a funding round led by Sumeru Ventures.
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has participated in an $80 million funding round in Lummo, a software-as-a-service (SaaS) company that helps small companies get online.
Vernacular learning platform Entri.app has raised $7 million in Series A round of investment led by Omidyar Network India.
Proactive For Her, a digital clinic for women’s outpatient healthcare, has raised $5.5 million in Series A funding led by Vertex Ventures and existing investor Nexus Venture Partners.
Enterprise SaaS platform Actyv.ai has raised $5 million in a Pre-Series A funding round from Dubai-based 1Digi Investment management firm.
Byju’s makes $200 mn bet on offline, hybrid tuition classes📚
Byju’s, the world’s most-valued online tutoring startup operated by Think and Learn Pvt. Ltd, has made forays into offline tuition classes with the launch of Byju’s Tuition Centre.
The edtech startup will invest as much as $200 million to operate and expand Byju’s Tuition Centre over the next 12 to 18 months, Mrinal Mohit, chief operating officer, Byju’s, told.
The company hopes to enroll one million students into the programme over the next two years and launch 500 such tuition centres across 200 cities this year. Byju’s hopes to create more than 10,000 jobs across the country with Byju’s Tuition Centre.
Byju’s acquired 10 companies since 2020, including Aakash Educational Services in April last year for nearly $1 billion. This is its biggest acquisition to date.
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