Working in the education sector was always a weekend activity, not a potential employment avenue. But in an emerging wave, students from the best academic institutes are getting inclined towards making a mark in the field of education.
Think of an Indian Institute of Management (IIM) or Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) graduate, and the first thing to come to mind is a plush job either in investment banking, consultancy or IT. However, the likes of Vardan Kabra and Ankita Diwekar-Kabra — students of IIM-Ahmedabad 2004 batch — are changing this thinking.
This duo conceptualised the Fountainhead Education Foundation — a custom-designed pre-school and childcare centre in Surat for children between the age of one and five adapted from internationally renowned methods.
“I got a Rs 7 lakh pre-placement offer from Procter and Gamble (P & G). But neither did I take it up nor sit for the placements. I believe that quality education should be a big business. There are not enough choices for students when it comes to schools and colleges today. And most want to get into whatever the limited options are available. The problem is that there is not enough competition.
The moment there is competition in this sector, it will undergo significant changes, like the telecom industry,” Vardan says.
Vardan’s is not a lone case. Following his footsteps in 2005, two of Vardan’s juniors at IIM-A, Sharat Chandra and Praveen Y decided to take the plunge into education. Coming from an IIT background, Sharat and Praveen decided to pursue their passion for science by creating Butterfly Fields, a supplementary school, which comprises various kinds of activities and experiences, specifically designed to make a child understand the underlying concepts or principles of science through games.
“Education is not just something to be looked at on weekends, we have a serious business plan. Having trained more than 3,000 students from various schools in Hyderabad, we are expanding our presence to other cities. We have also got offers from Indian schools in the UAE to set up our centres, which are being considered,” says Sharat.
The foray into education was not an easy decision considering he had a pre-placement offer from one of the leading international banks.
But within one year, the duo have managed to catch the eye of private equity investors who are keen on picking up stake in the company. More recognition followed after they created a mini-museum-cum-science centre at a school in Hyderabad, which hosted a visit from scientists of NASA. The company has a team of eight, where most of the employees are IIT graduates and more are expected to join soon.
Even as their classmates bag prestigious offers from top corporate houses across the world, these entrepreneurs say that they would prefer to pool in their own resources and create their own paycheques. For most of them, finance is the main constraint, but they eventually manage to find their way around it. Vardan’s Fountainhead, which started with an initial funding of about 13 lakhs from family and friends, has now tied up with a local diamond businessman to set up another 10 acre campus with an investment of Rs 5 crore.
One such venture by IIM alumni, Education Initiatives (EI), has managed to attract a number of investors. The company, which deals with school education and assessment has received its first round of investments from a consortium of investors including Footprint Ventures, Novak Biddle Venture Partners, the ICICI Bank supported IFMR Trust and industrialist Gautam Thapar.
Officials of the company say that the fund will be used to give a wider reach to its testing division as well as expanding operations abroad which has generated interest from schools in West Asia and Singapore.
“Close to 2 lakh students from 1,800 schools have taken our assessment test so far and following the company’s expansion across more states, close to 10 lakh students are expected to be covered in the next three years,” said Sudhir Ghodke, Director of EI and a graduate from IIM-Ahmedabad. The company’s flagship test is conducted for classes 3-10 and assesses students’ comprehension in mathematics, science and english.
Two years ago, four enterprising students of IIM Ahmedabad had decided to opt out of placements to create their own lingerie brand despite getting one crore salary offers. But then education beckoned and they launched a company called Quetzal Online Private Limited. The company deals in educational software and services in the form of websites like engineerprep.com for engineering and tenaday.co.in for MBA entrance exams.
Similarly, K S Bhaskar from IIM-Calcutta started Ascent Education, which provides assistance for CAT preparation. Bhaskar claims that since 2002 over 15 per cent of its students make it to the top B-Schools in India like the six IIMs every year.
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