Karti Chidambaram wants govt to probe edtech giant BYJU’s finances

Chidambaram called for a inquiry into BYJU’s for not filing its 2020- 21( FY21) fiscal results, which the company had before stated to file by July 15, saying that it has yet to secure$ 250 million( around Rs,500 crore) capital from its most recent backing round in March. 

 On March 17, BYJU’s blazoned that it has raised$ 800 million( Rs,401 crore) from Sumeru gambles, Vitruvian mates, and BlackRock. Byju Raveendran, author and CEO of the company had made a particular investment of$ 400 million( Rs,200 crore) in this fundraise. 

” A report refocused out that Byju’s forms with the Union Ministry of Corporate Affairs indicate that,031 Series F preference shares were distributed to Vitruvian mates on March 29, 2022 for Rs 571 crore. There has been no similar stuffing in the case of Sumeru gambles or BlackRock since the company’s advertisement on March 17. This raises a question of the missing Rs,500 crore in the company’s backing,” the Congress MP said in his letter. 

 In October 2021, New York- grounded Oxshott is said to have made an investment of Rs,200 crore in BYJU’s. ” Nine months on and BYJU’s has verified that it has not yet entered this backing from the investor, Oxshott Capital Partners has till date only made one investment in BYJU’s,” read the letter addressed to the director of SFIO. 

 Oxshott invested Rs,200 crore as part of the Series F round at Rs,072 per share, which was yet to arrive. ” Oxshott was not leading the round. In fact, they were one of the last investors to come in for that round. Out of the total Rs,600 crore, Rs,400 crore has formerly come in,” a company prophet had told IANS before. Chidambaram said that” BYJU’s has not yet gotten its fiscal statements for FY2020- 21 checked from its adjudicator Deloitte, and will take further time to file the cost inspection Report to the Ministry”. 

” This is in clear violation of Rule 6( 5) of the Companies( Cost Records and inspection) Rules, 2014. At a time when BYJU’s proposes to expand its business and acquire Nasdaq- listed company 2U at a valuation of$2.4 billion, while parallelly blasting workers to cut costs, it becomes material to review the company’s finances,” he said. 

 The edtech major was yet to reply to Chidambaram’s letter to the SFIO. The edtech unicorn made at least 10 accessions for a accretive sale value of about$2.5 billion last time. Multiple accessions were made in FY21 and each of these accessions had a different account style and time, according to the company. 

The company lately said the$ 1 billion accession process of Aakash Educational Services is on track and is anticipated to be completed by August. BYJUs is also aiming to file an IPO in the US through the SPAC route. 

The Ministry of Consumer Affairs this month pulled up BYJU’s and its group companies for aggressive mis- selling of courses to parents. before this month, the Centre advised edtech companies against illegal trade practices.