How the Unacademy-upGrad deal unfolded; Why AI could push India’s ER&D revenue past $100B
The Unacademy-upGrad deal began with an audacious pitch, recalls Ronnie Screwvala. Meanwhile, a Nasccom study says the engineering research and development (ER&D) services revenue from India is projected to cross $100 billion by 2030, up from $63 billion in FY26, driven by AI.
Dear Reader,
upGrad has wrapped up the acquisition of Unacademy for a little over $200 million.
The deal almost did not happen. The two companies failed to agree on a valuation early this year. After months of negotiations, the acquisition is now complete, bringing together two major edtech businesses in the country.
The final deal value is more than 90% lower than Unacademy’s peak valuation of $3.4 billion in 2021. The steep reset reflects how investor expectations for consumer edtech have changed since the pandemic-era boom. The acquisition gives upGrad greater scale and a wider range of offerings, while drawing the curtain on Unacademy’s journey as a standalone company.
Still on consolidation, insurtech startups InsuranceDekho and RenewBuy have announced a merger to build a pan-India insurance distribution platform. This brings together InsuranceDekho’s strong presence in northern and western India with RenewBuy’s network in the south.
The combined entity will start with considerable scale: a premium book of over Rs 6,600 crore, more than 6 lakh digital partners, and coverage across 98% of India’s pin codes.
In other news, Electronics and IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw has outlined a 20-year vision for building the country’s semiconductor ecosystem.
Semicon 2.0—the second phase of India’s semiconductor programme with an outlay of Rs 1.27 lakh crore—seeks to boost local manufacturing and strengthen the country’s design and skills base.
The challenge for India is not simply to make chips but to build enough depth to compete across the value chain.
In today’s newsletter:
- How the Unacademy-upGrad deal unfolded
- Why AI could push India’s ER&D revenue past $100 billion
Here’s your trivia for today: What makes the 1939 novel Gadsby a lipogram? (Scroll down for the answer)
Edtech
Unacademy-upGrad deal began with an audacious pitch: Screwvala
How it unfolded:
- About six years ago, over lunch at Taj Lands End in Mumbai, Unacademy founder Gaurav Munjal approached Ronnie Screwvala and Mayank Kumar, co-founders of upGrad, with a proposal. It was more than a merger.
- “He came in proposing he could run the whole combined entity. Obviously, that wasn’t something we had in mind at that stage,” Screwvala says in a post on X. What stayed with him, he adds, was Munjal’s willingness to approach a much larger business, speak openly about his ambitions, and make the case for a combination.
- Cut to today—a “happy” deal that blends the best of the two companies. upGrad has depth in higher education, online degrees, professional learning, and career development while Unacademy brings a large consumer education platform, a test-prep business, and a product culture built around technology and educators. Together, they give upGrad a presence across many touchpoints in a learner’s journey.
<Funding Alert>
Startup: Yuma Energy
Amount: $35M
Round: Series A
Startup: Kepler Aerospace
Amount: $8M
Round: Seed
Startup: Guickly
Amount: $4.2M
Round: Seed
Study
AI to drive India’s ER&D revenue past $100B by 2030
The engineering research and development (ER&D) services revenue from India is projected to cross $100 billion by 2030, up from an estimated $63 billion in FY26, as artificial intelligence (AI) and emerging technologies reshape global product development, according to Nasscom.
Key takeaways:
- The shift towards software-defined, data-driven and intelligent engineering is creating new opportunities for Indian ER&D companies to expand beyond traditional engineering execution and take on greater system-level and lifecycle ownership.
- AI is increasingly being embedded across the engineering lifecycle, moving beyond productivity-focused applications into product design, development, testing and operations.
- A key emerging opportunity is Physical AI, which brings AI capabilities into physical products, equipment and industrial environments, according to Nasscom’s study titled ‘Physical AI – Redefining ER&D Opportunity for India’.
News & updates
- Rest in peace: Khadim Batti, the co-founder and CEO of SaaS company Whatfix, has passed away due to a cardiac arrest. He was 49. Batti had co-founded Whatfix with Vara Kumar in 2014 in Bengaluru. The company is a digital adoption platform that provides real-time, in-app guidance, training, and analytics for users.
- New brand: Reliance Consumer Products Limited, the FMCG arm of Reliance Industries Limited, has launched a new brand ‘Bombay Creamery’, marking its entry into the country’s burgeoning ice cream market.
- Merger: ITC Infotech, a wholly-owned subsidiary of diversified conglomerate ITC Ltd, will merge with Bengaluru-based Happiest Minds Technologies to create an AI-first enterprise with a $1 billion turnover by FY28.
What makes the 1939 novel ‘Gadsby’ a lipogram?
Answer: It doesn’t contain the letter ‘e’.
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