Matrix-backed Testbook raises INR 60 cr led by Iron Pillar
8th January 2020. Mumbai: Testbook, an ed-tech company that helps students prepare for Government Job Recruitment Exams, announced today that it has raised INR 60 cr in its Series B round of funding led by Iron Pillar. The round also saw participation from existing investor Matrix Partners India, as well as Better Capital, AngelList India and Vikas Choudhury (President, Reliance Jio).
Founded in 2014 by a team of IIT graduates, Testbook is a comprehensive, online learning, practice and assessment platform enabling students to prepare for recruitment exams of Government jobs such as SBI PO, SSC CGL, IBPS PO, Railways and many more. Preparation for entry-level jobs including government positions is a $7 billion market with over 90 million aspirants looking for such jobs every year.
Pioneering the shift of exam preparation from offline to online, Testbook has served over 10 million users till date and has 50,000+ monthly paying students. Testbook has also been at the forefront of launching unique products for these aspirants including Comprehensive Live Course with Study Plan, Platform wise subscriptions for Courses & Mock Tests and Digital Sample Papers.
Commenting on the fundraise, Ashutosh Kumar, Co-Founder & CEO, Testbook said,"We're thrilled and excited to partner with Iron Pillar on our journey to build the best outcome-driven learning platform for students to prepare for any government exam. With this growth capital, Testbook will aim to scale its Live Courses and Mock Tests from the current 100 exams to 400 exams. Content partnerships with reputed institutions on top of our in-house content production capability will provide extra mileage. Testbook will also invest in Data Science and Machine Learning to make the entire learning cycle adaptive for students so that the curriculum and their study plans are personalized for them. Testbook has been the most popular brand for millions of government job aspirants for its high quality and affordable Mock Tests, and now we are receiving the same response from students for our Live Courses which we believe will be 10x better in the coming days.'
"We're delighted to invest in Testbook, a differentiated ed-tech company addressing a large market via a structured, adaptive and result-oriented curriculum. This investment fits well with Iron Pillar's approach of backing visionary entrepreneurs who are driving innovation along with proven execution and capital efficiency. We look forward to partnering with Ashutosh, Narendra and the Testbook team on the next phase of their growth and to collaborating with a terrific group of investors, led by Matrix.' said Sameer Nath, Managing Partner, Iron Pillar.
"We're privileged to be early partners with Ashutosh, Narendra and the Testbook team, and to have had a ringside view to their remarkable growth journey. Over the last two years, they have successfully transitioned from a test-prep. company to a full-blown online learning platform '“ all achieved while being highly capital efficient and with strong unit economics. We look forward to the next leg of the journey and welcome Iron Pillar to this partnership.' said Rajat Agarwal, Director, Matrix India.
About Testbook:
Testbook.com is a new-age start-up initiated by a group of IITians who believe that technology is the way forward to form a platform that can empower learning and preparation for government job entrance exams. The market has a massive gap in this field as over 90 million applicants vie for a fraction of the number of central and state government jobs available. The personalized learning and assessment platform has been instrumental in providing a full-stack portal to prepare for employment. The curriculum provides live online mock tests that imitate the actual interface used in examinations. There are Live Classes, Tutorial Videos, Doubt Classes and comparative Test Analytics to provide a compelling study orientation to students.
Testbook was started in January 2014. The team has the vision to bring content online and offer students a better learning experience than offline coaching on both website and App. With 10 Million registered users and 500,000 active paid subscribers, the selection rate has been 7x better than the national average of 1%. Testbook has produced more than 35,000 selections across different government jobs in the last three years. The use of superior technology has made Testbook best in class. All modules are intricately designed with the exam curriculum in mind. Each student receives important questions for self-assessment, revisions, and practice. Nearly 40,000 free questions, 3,000 mock tests and 70 courses are available at all times. Testbook has found an innovative method to crack the reluctance of the Indian masses to pay online by launching a unique code-based voucher called Testbook PASS. The PASS is available through simple cash mode transactions across 500 retails outlets which includes offline institutes, cyber cafes and book stores. More information on Testbook can be found here: www.testbook.com
About Iron Pillar:
Iron Pillar is a venture growth investor specializing in mid stage technology companies in India. Founded in January 2016, Iron Pillar launched India's first independent venture growth fund, providing Series B, C and D capital to proven businesses in the enterprise and consumer technology sectors. The 5-member Iron Pillar founding team brings 100 years of combined experience and directly relevant skill sets in venture investing, M&A/IPO/Exits, operations and technology. The team leverages their extensive experience and global network to actively partner with entrepreneurs who are poised to scale their businesses. The Iron Pillar portfolio includes several market leading companies such as BlueStone, Servify, SEDEMAC, Vyome Therapeutics, Fresh To Home and Uniphore. Additional information is available at www.ironpillarfund.com
About Matrix Partners India:
Matrix Partners India is an investment firm with approximately $1 billion under management. Founded in 2006, the firm invests in companies targeting the Indian consumer and enterprise market at the seed, early and early growth stages. Matrix India has invested in several market leading companies such as Ola (local transportation), Quikr (online classifieds), Practo (digital health platform), Dailyhunt (mobile local language platform), Treebo (digital hotel chain), Limeroad (social e-commerce platform), Mswipe (mobile POS), Five Star Business Finance (SME lending), OfBusiness (credit led B2B marketplace), Ola Electric (multimodal electric vehicle platform), Razorpay (payments), Stanza Living (tech enabled student housing platform) Vogo (scooter sharing) and Cloudnine Hospitals (leading chain of maternity hospitals), among others. Matrix India has advisory offices in Bangalore, Delhi and Mumbai. Matrix Partners has a global network of funds investing in the US, China and India, with approximately $5 billion under management. Further information is available at www.matrixpartners.in
