Edtech company upGrad pushes big ticket courses in expansion of offline centres to 40 this fiscal
UpGrad is increasing its offline presence by expanding its so-called learning support centres to 40, initially targeting South India. This approach aims to meet the demand for big ticket certification and provide personalized support for students in high-demand fields like AI and data science.
Upskilling and higher education platform upGrad is scaling up its offline learning push with plans to increase 11 pilot centres it has to 40 by the end of the financial year, according to a top executive at the company.
In doing so, the effort is to focus on higher priced products ranging from ₹80,000 to ₹1.2 lakh, mostly focused on artificial intelligence and machine learning. These are short format curated courses meant specially for their offline centres.
“These are high involvement products where users are looking for counselling face to face to address their queries and concerns, as opposed to doing it online or on a video call," Manish Kalra chief operating officer for upGrad's offline business told Mint.
The push by Temasek-backed upGrad is in line with others in the edtech sector increasing their offline presence. Startups such as Unacademy and PhysicsWallah have both made an offline push with what they call Unacademy Centres and Vidyapeeth, respectively.
In fact, the red herring prospectus of PhysicsWallah, which is raising ₹3,480-crore from the public market, showed that nearly half of its revenue comes from its Vidyapeeth centres.
Even for upGrad, the company started with a purely online play to allow for learners to pick up courses and work on them whenever they can, apart from their existing jobs.
“The offline expansion of edtech companies reflects a shift toward assuring outcomes through structured learning environments and personalized feedback — while still leveraging the efficiency of a tech-first, hybrid approach," said Amit Nawka, technology deals partner at PwC India. “Physical touchpoints are helping these companies drive retention, improve unit economics, and build trust with parents and learners alike."
upGrad offline
The company began its offline push with a pilot effort for what it calls Learning Support Centres, or LSCs, earlier this year and now has 11 of them operational across India. “We went into this with the assumption that it will help us generate higher conversions and drive better efficiency for the organisation," said Kalra.
The LSCs are offline hubs where the company engages local talent, alongside subject-matter experts, as well as industry professionals to teach early career professionals and new graduates in high-demand domains. All of this is combined with what the company calls “guided internships" with corporates where learners engage in project-based learning.
The average age of people entering upGrad's LSCs is between 21 and 26. “The target group is people who are in their final year and aren't sure if they'll get a job or not," said Kalra. "That's in addition to people who graduated two years back and haven't got a job of their choice and are looking to upskill."
At the moment, upGrad's most offline popular courses are on artificial intelligence and data science accounting for at least 60% sign-ups. Next in demand are full stack development and digital marketing courses. “We'll be bringing in new courses in January and then again in April which will be more feature ready," Kalra said. “We're also looking at what jobs are coming to India and what are the trending skills so we can enable them."
Learners at LSCs are also taken through mock interviews, taught how to structure their thoughts and process questions to answer them appropriately.
upGrad's skill boosting programmes, are especially sought after by students with English fluency challenges. In fact, language learning among edtech companies has seen a boost with several raising funds to address customers viewing English as a means of upward mobility.
South, west focus
The company's 11 LSCs have been spread across the country in places like Bhilwara in Rajasthan as well as Bhopal and Indore in Madhya Pradesh. “Indore is actually one of our top five centres. Third after Bengaluru" said Kalra.
The company is planning a staggered expansion with south India being the first focus, followed by the west before adding more centres in the north and then the east.
“For the 40 centres we're focusing on the south first and a little bit of the west," said Kalra. “We're not shying away from going into places like Belgaum or Hubli because if I can cater to demand there, then these students don't have to migrate to other cities and incur higher costs."
Moneycontrol reported last week that upGrad was in talks to acquire Unacademy at a valuation of $300-400 million.
topics
