In past editions of this column, start-ups in education have taken centre stage to discuss the attraction the space holds for investment as well as to look closely at how these businesses had chosen to scale up. With angel funding in the space not as high earlier as private equity investments were, we’ve also discussed the benefits of bootstrapping and the lean model in the initial years of operations.

But neither shortage of funding nor having to be lean means the quality of delivery becomes poor. A few like Edureka and Simplilearn stand out for impressing investors and expanding their reach to other geographies while altering their models over time for better delivery.

To write the India Story, however, it takes an equal if not bigger focus on home turf.

Lean to mean

The opportunity is ripe. More than five years ago, The Gate Academy began operations as a coaching initiative. In India, coaching for a various entrance exams isn’t a new phenomenon. GATE is a graduate aptitude test for engineering students. Founders Ritesh Raushan and Nitin Rakesh Prasad, first generation entrepreneurs, took their company from a chalk-based, classroom model to what is now a successful blended model. Although they had no commercial aspirations initially, the growing interest of students meant that Raushan and Prasad decided to scale up.

“It helped that the market moved in our favour. PSUs made the GATE score mandatory for recruitment and with 30-35 PSUs demanding applicants have these scores, it was perfect timing,” says The Gate Academy’s Co-founder and Director Raushan.

Strokes of luck are great for businesses. But with applications to the GATE exam numbering more than a million each year, the Academy now catering to over 10 lakh students each year means there was more than fate’s smile involved. When they kicked off in 2009, they had a mere 100 students.

The company has crossed ₹7 crore in revenues with the last quarter and has its eyes on ₹14 crore by this March-end.

Technology and scale

Like many edupreneurship ventures at the outset, The Gate Academy was bootstrapped. But Raushan and Prasad poured much of their capital into generating content, taking care of fundamentals.

With 41 franchises and nine of their own centres spread across the country, Raushan claims that there is an intake of nearly 1,000 students for their well established centres.

Over the years, they developed a B2B model in which they provide coaching at institutions. To beef up delivery, real-time online coaching is available and so is distance learning. Leading in their target markets meant strengthening technology back-ends and forging strong partnerships that enable delivery and maintain scale. Nearly two years ago, the Academy ventured into tablet-based education.

“We plan to introduce micro-courses to increase our e-commerce revenues. There will be more tie-ups with institutions in the coming months, we already have forged one with NIT Agartala. In 2015, we’ll add 15 centres in cities like Gwalior, Nagpur, Bhubhaneshwar and the larger Delhi region. We’ll also go to private companies and provide them with GATE certified talent,” elaborates Raushan.

Many start-ups in education space have big objectives. But focusing in one segment like technology education or higher education is helping some deeply penetrate captive markets.

Angel investments into education businesses are going up, albeit gradually. High profile private equity investments will continue given the scope of many of the start-ups in the fray to scale up efficiently.

Even as eduprenuership becomes hot all over the world, technology adoption and sensitivity to market needs along with astute scaling up may see entrepreneurs here collectively shaping an India Story.

And while many have made inroads into international markets, the home turf is a vital part of that big story.

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