Edtech start-up Sunstone Eduversity has raised $28 million Series B funding from WestBridge Capital, along with the participation of existing investors Saama Capital and Alteria Capital.
Work10m (work-focussed fund by Pankaj Bansal, Group-CEO PeopleStrong) also participated in the round. The company will use the fresh capital to invest in cutting-edge learning and technology assets, building a network of colleges across multiple cities, and hiring across different functions.
Founded by IMT-Ghaziabad alumnus Ashish Munjal and Piyush Nangru, Sunstone offers higher education programs in partnership with several colleges and private universities. Sunstone has over 300 employees and plans to hire across technology, growth, product, and learning functions.
New programmes
In partnership with various universities, Sunstone has added three new programmess this year: BBA, MCA, and Online MBA, and will be introducing various undergraduate programs such as BCA, B.Com and BSc in the next 12 months. It will be enrolling over 25,000 students across 35 cities by the end of 2022.
“Sunstone’s higher education programs have the potential to bring in the much awaited transformation in the Indian education system where students will now have access to a high quality education product in all corners of the country," said Sandeep Singhal, Managing Director, WestBridge Capital.
This year thousands of students have joined Sunstone, with the institute registering a 4X growth over student enrollments in 2020. It has also expanded its presence in 24 campuses across 18 cities, including some of the prominent institutions such as GD Goenka University, JECRC University, Noida Institute of Engineering and Technology and several others.
“We are building Sunstone to become the de facto choice for pursuing higher education for Indian youth. Education experience for a majority of students is still archaic, input driven, with zero focus on outcomes. Sunstone flips the norm, by putting outcomes at the forefront, and arms each student with tools they need to realise their dreams. The current funding is an endorsement to Sunstone’s unique model of working with reputed colleges and corporates and using technology to bring quality education to millions of students,” Ashish Munjal, Co-Founder, Sunstone Eduversity
Placements
The company delivered a 150 per cent placement rate for its 2019-21 MBA batch, where 252 students received 380 job offers. Sunstone works closely with corporates to develop industry-ready programs for postgraduate and undergraduate students, with a special focus on BFSI, Business Analytics, Logistics, Sales Management, Retail, Digital Marketing and others.
The Indian higher education system is highly fragmented, with more than 50,000 institutions across the country. These institutions are not able to provide quality education to the students. Sunstone’s approach is to work with educational institutions on four fronts relevant curriculum, measurable learning, better student experience and career readiness. These four aspects are integrated through a technology layer that differentiates Sunstone from other alternatives.