Vedantu appoints Ranjan Sakalley as head of engineering and tech; to hire 80 people by March '21

Online live tutoring company Vedantuon Monday said it has appointed Ranjan Sakalley as head of engineering and technology, and plans to expand its engineering team to 200 people by March 2021.

Based in Bengaluru, Sakalley will report to Vedantu CEO and Co-founder Vamsi Krishna, and will spearhead the expansion of the company's tech and engineering team to 200 members by the end of this financial year, it said in a statement.

In his new role, Sakalley will oversee all product engineering decisions, including design, delivery, and reliability of products.

Currently, the company has about 120 people in its tech and engineering team.

"The hires will happen at multiple levels including senior as well as supporting roles. The team will drive further innovation to increase accessibility, affordability, and predictability in LIVE online learning," the statement said.

Krishna said Sakalley is an industry veteran and engineering leader adept at solving complex and real-time business challenges.

"Owing to his eclectic experience, he brings the best of both worlds with startup and enterprise-led thinking. As Ranjan partners in our journey to create Impact at scale, we endeavour to create a service where a child feels loved, cared, and inspired, and technology has always been central to creating that experience and impact," Krishna added.

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On his appointment, Sakalley said Vedantu is investing heavily on engineering to make live online class seamless, highly interactive and engaging, and his role will be to build predictable learning outcomes for millions of students who are learning on the platform.

Sakalley has two decades of expertise in building and scaling teams at Gojek, GoPay, Thoughtworks, Proteans, and Everest Software Inc, among others.

In his previous roles, he has built products and custom software to solve tough distributed computing issues, complex real time business functions at scale as well as engineered exciting new products and features for end users.

Vedantu's total subscriber base stands at about 2.7 million. In July, Vedantu had announced raising $100 million (about Rs 752 crore) in funding, led by US-based investment firm Coatue, pushing its valuation to $600 million.

Vedantu's total fundraise has crossed $200 million. It has raised money from investors like Tiger Global Management, Accel Partners, Omidyar Network, TAL, and WestBridge Capital.

The edtech space has seen strong growth globally, including in India, with the COVID-19 pandemic serving as an inflection point.

While a number of players have raised fresh funding from investors, consolidation is also being seen in the industry with deals like Unacademyacquiring PrepLadderfor $50 million and BYJU'Sbuying WhiteHat Jr for $300 million.