Unacademy enters the unicorn club with a $150 million funding from SoftBank

• The five-year old startup has entered the unicorn club with a $1.45 billion valuation after the much-talked about funding from SoftBank.
• Earlier in February, the startup had raised funds from social media giant Facebook.
• Unacademy also found itself trending for the wrong reasons on Twitter as one of its educators was called out for sharing videos inciting hatred on the platform.

It’s been quite the year for Unacademy. The five-year old startup has entered the unicorn club with a $1.45 billion valuation after the much-talked about funding from SoftBank. This also marks SoftBank’s first investment in an Indian startup this year.

Unacademy had also raised funding from Facebook in February, which was the social media giant’s second direct investment in India. The startup is also backed by Sequoia India, Nexus Venture Partners, Steadview Capital and Blume Ventures, and individual investors Kalyan Krishnamurthy, CEO, Flipkart and Sujeet Kumar, co-founder, Udaan.

“Our goal has always been to democratise knowledge and make it more affordable and accessible by getting the best experts of the world to help everyone achieve their goals. We are just getting started,” wrote Gaurav Munjal, co-founder of Unacademy on Twitter.


The startup was also one of the edtech startups which has benefited from the coronavirus lockdown and the subsequent shift to online learning. The startup has over 13 million learners on its platform.

However, on a day that could have been a straight win for its founders, Unacademy found itself in trouble when one of its educators was reportedly found sharing a video on the platform inciting hatred. Unacademy released a statement saying that the educator has pulled down the video and apologized for the same. The startup in a statement also added that it does not endorse any hateful content.


The startup is also one of the official sponsors for the Indian Premier League.

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