Under fire for all the wrong reasons, BYJU’S has decided to rebrand WhiteHat Jr, one of its fully-owned subsidiaries. The rebranding will involve the complete integration of the company’s assets into various business verticals, including its holding entity, Think & Learn Private Limited.
The edtech giant will be rebranding WhiteHat Jr as ‘BYJU’S Future School’ with an expanded offline presence. “The senior management is still very optimistic about the product and so it will be rebranded with a bigger offline play,” Moneycontrol reported citing a source.
Having acquired WhiteHat Jr in 2020 for $300 Mn, BYJU’S has seen the acquisition make headlines, often for unfavourable reasons. The subsidiary has earned a reputation as one of the most substantial loss-making entities within BYJU’S.
The edtech behemoth has invested over $100 Mn in the coding platform since the acquisition to fuel its expansion. The merger and the rebrand to BYJU’S Future School could potentially aid the edtech in mitigating some financial losses, considering its present constrained cash position.
According to BYJU’S FY21 results, WhiteHat Jr contributed INR 326.66 Cr to the total revenue but incurred a loss of INR 1,548.76 Cr before tax.
Amidst ongoing challenges with the entity, there were rumours implying that BYJU’S might consider shutting down WhiteHat Jr, owing to difficulties in establishing a product-market fit.
As BYJU’S progresses with the merger in the current fiscal year, it will incorporate an impairment cost linked to WhiteHat Jr, as per sources. However, since the edtech leader has not yet submitted its FY22 financials halfway through FY24, the precise cost of the merger will not be immediately disclosed.
Incidentally, BYJU’S is also said to have massively reduced the workforce at WhiteHat Jr since the start of the year. Last year, Inc42 exclusively reported the coding-focused edtech platform allegedly forced nearly 800 employees to resign.
That was followed by the platform laying off another 300 employees.
While most of the employees are said to have been laid off, the remaining staffers were transitioned to the payrolls of Think & Learn, which runs BYJU’S core K-12 business. Think & Learn employees have also been overseeing the operations of WhiteHat Jr, sources said.
Earlier this month, WhiteHat Jr’s CEO Ananya Tripathi also put in her papers after going on a maternity break in May. Apart from Tripathi, BYJU’S has seen a slew of senior-level exits in the past two months across its group entities.
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