SpeedLabs’ Vivek Varshney on the physics of surviving EdTech

Two hours of daily electricity, no CBSE schools and a single narrow-gauge train to IIT Kanpur formed the backdrop of SpeEdLabs Founder Vivek Varshney’s early life in Kasganj, Uttar Pradesh. That lone railway track launched an improbable trajectory from a Hindi-medium schooling to IIT Kanpur, then IIM Lucknow and senior investment banking roles at Morgan Stanley and Deutsche Bank in London.

Yet, his defining choice came in 2015 when he walked away from a settled global banking career to build an education venture from scratch. Today, SpeEdLabs serves over 750 schools and 150,000 students, a milestone built through years of burnt capital, board scrutiny and a decisive pivot to profitability.

The early days in London

By 2015, Varshney had spent over a decade in global equity research and private equity. Standing in London during a leadership stint with Deutsche Bank, he found himself at a crossroads where he could opt for an international posting or step out to build something enduring.

“It’s not a trivial choice once you are doing well in your career, especially coming from a financially humble background. But in 2015, India was crossing major digital inflection points and I didn’t want to live with the regret of not trying,” he said, as he spoke to Mint Associate Editor Abhishek Singh in the latest episode of Mint Rollin’ with the Boss, brought to you by luxury partner Lexus.

This entrepreneurial risk that he was taking was not his first setback. Fresh out of IIT Kanpur during the 2002 dot-com bust, Varshney recalled how he was rejected in 14 consecutive job interviews. He was held back primarily due to his spoken English. He addressed the gap during his MBA at IIM Lucknow, a lesson in resilience that came in handy when SpeEdLabs faced a commercial winter a decade later.

Taming the growth beast

Founded in 2016, SpeEdLabs was conceived as a personalised and adaptive learning platform designed to help K-12 students prepare for competitive exams like JEE and NEET. Using algorithmic diagnostics, the software analyses a student’s practice data to determine their “proximal zone of learning”, focusing efforts where incremental gains can be achieved.

Between 2020-21, amidst a global venture capital surge into EdTech, SpeEdLabs raised nearly $4 million and expanded its workforce to over 500 employees. However, as pandemic-induced remote learning tapered off, the company discovered a flaw in consumer behaviour where online engagement alone did not equal sustainable product consumption.

“When you burn a lot of money to scale much before your product-market fit has happened, you lose the bandwidth to fix what isn’t working. Scale must strictly follow PMF, not precede it,” he said.

The issue was that students lacked the extra time to log onto an independent digital platform. No matter how accurate the analytics were, the platform lacked the necessary data stream if students couldn’t find the time to use it.

Rewiring the business model

Recognising the issue, SpeEdLabs adapted to a hybrid model wherein the company published physical textbooks directly mapped to its digital diagnostic application. Students could solve core exercises in print or on the app, feeding real-time performance data back into the adaptive engine without adding hours to their workload.

Subsequently, SpeEdLabs cut its monthly cash burn rate which had reached ₹2 crore per month, by roughly 20 per cent month-over-month. Supported by core investors such as 35 North Ventures, the executive team restructured the business around unit economics and frugal execution.

The company expanded its reach from just nine partner schools in its early pilot phase to nearly 750 schools, currently serving over 1,50,000 active students. Financially, revenues increased from approximately ₹4.5 crore to ₹40 crore, before doubling again year-over-year in FY26. Operating margins followed a similar trajectory, turning EBITDA positive at 3.5% in FY25 before expanding to 11% in FY26.

Education as the ultimate currency

Operating with positive operating cash flows, SpeEdLabs targets further EBITDA margin expansion to 17-18% in FY27 as fixed overhead costs stabilise relative to top-line expansion.

Reflecting on the journey, Varshney felt that education in emerging markets cannot be solved by short-term consumer tech playbooks. For thousands of students from Tier-2 and Tier-3 towns like him, competitive examinations remain the primary lever for socio-economic mobility.

“For middle and lower-middle-class families, education is often the only currency available to break out of poverty. If you are playing a long game in this space, the primary duty of a founder is simply to survive the rough patches until the model holds,” Varshney said.

Note to Readers: This episode of Mint Rollin' with the Boss was produced in partnership with SpeEdlabs. Lexus is the Luxury Partner.