vedantu layoffs: Edtech unicorn Vedantu lays off 200 employees

This comes as startups continue to prune costs amid a tightening in the late-stage funding landscape.

A company spokesperson told Et that nearly 120 of these employees are contractual staff and the rest full-time employees.

Almost all of those laid off were from the company’s academic teams, working as assistant teachers.

“We have over 6,000 employees, out of which roughly 120 contractors and 80 full-time or 3.5% of the total strength are academics or assistant teachers, which were being re-evaluated,” the spokesperson said. “We have an annual contract with them, and at the beginning of every academic year, we follow a process of load rebalancing where we rejig pertaining to these roles, based on our growth expectations.”

Vedantu has been focusing on reducing the cost of its courses to manage the tapering demand for online education, as offline learning centres open up.

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The company has used Artificial Intelligence, voice synthesis and content development to bring down course expenses.

It is also leveraging technology to reduce overall costs, which is also one of the reasons for the restructuring exercise, the company said.

“With more technology intervention, restructuring of the class format, and changes in the categories, we relook at these roles of our academics and assistant teachers. As we synchronize our growth goals for this year, we are also hiring more than 1,000 employees in various teams, including over 100 for similar positions,” the spokesperson added.

On April 28, ET reported that more than
1,800 contractual and full-time employees had cumulatively been fired from various startups, as investors began to ask high-growth companies to go back to basics — chase profits and reduce their cash burn.

Companies that have laid off employees over the past month include edtech firm
Unacademy, social commerce startups
Meesho and
Trell, online learning platform Lido Learning, and
furniture rental startup Furlenco.

Some of these companies may look to cut more jobs, ET had reported earlier, citing sources.

As investors ramp up due diligence amid a softening of public market valuations, many late-stage rounds have been delayed, increasing pressure on late-stage companies to reduce their cash burn. Industry experts say if these startups fail to raise newer rounds, the layoffs could deepen amid a funding slowdown.