BYJU’s expects three-fold revenue growth in FY22, looses to halve

BYJU‘s Founder and CEO Byju Raveendran, at a startup event on Friday, defended roping in football star Lionel Messi as its global ambassador amid job cuts at the company, saying the decision was taken six months ago.

Raveendran said that the company with over 150 million learners, is well on its path to profitability as it expects revenue grow by three times and losses to be more than halved in FY22.

The company had booked a loss of ₹4,588 crore and revenue of ₹2,428 crore for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2021.

BYJU’s co-founder Divya Gokulnath had announced laying off around 2,500 people from the company as it eyes to be profitable by March 2023 and hires 10,000 more teachers in the coming year, adding to its current strength of 20,000 teachers.

Raveendran said India deserves more than 75,000 startups, and he sees potential for a million entrepreneurs in the country.

“When pressed on the current environment around the company, Byju alluded that 261 of the company’s 300 founding employees are still with the company and are committed to the mission of BYJU’S,” he said.

He further stated that four of five integrations are seamlessly done and performing well.

“Aakash, since its integration with BYJU’S, has grown three times,” the company note said.

On hiring Messi as its global brand ambassador, he said the announcement just happened to coincide with the lay-offs and the decision was taken six months ago.

“It is foolish to even think that one can hire Messi in 5-7 days. The decision to bring Messi on board was taken 6 months ago and that the announcement could not have been delayed, owing to the World Cup window and rules,” he said.

Messi would not be allowed to make any brand announcements while the World Cup is underway. It’s a mere coincidence that both the news, rationalisation and Messi onboarding coincided,” he said.