The most important question about Unacademy

Throughout its journey, Unacademy raised over $850 Million, and reached a valuation of $3.4 Billion when it got a $440M round back in August 2021.

Three years later (in 2024), it tried to sell itself to Allen for $800M. That didn’t work out.

Getting valued at less than the amount raised over the course of 10 years is a great fall. But a year later (in 2025), it tried to sell itself to upGrad for $300M. Turns out, that didn't work out either. upGrad has moved on from the conversation.

Both discussions fell apart due to valuation differences, despite Unacademy having about $160M as cash in the bank (which got reduced to $130M a year after). So cash reserves aside, its business was only getting discussed at a valuation of $640M in 2024, and $170M in 2025. Which is obviously an extraordinary drop from a peak of $3.4B.

Now two questions can prop up at this stage:

1. What is the true value of Unacademy right now, and

2. What were folks who valued it at $3.4B smoking back in 2021

The first question is rather simple to answer. Unacademy is a loss making business with declining revenues. Has always been. In the last FY, it had sales of ~$90M, with losses of over $50M. In the FY prior, it had a sales of ~$110M, at a loss of $76M. Ever since it started 10 years ago, it's never come close to breaking even, and since 2021 has made over ₹7130 Cr (~$800M) in net losses.

The only good way Unacademy has ever earned money has been interest on its FDs. Like in FY23, it earned ₹137 Cr from it.

So the true value of Unacademy's business, for all practical purposes, is a song. You could give it a revenue multiple of .5-.8x, which translates to about $45 to $70M. And then add its cash reserves of ~$130M. Hence about $185 - $200M is what it's worth. Fair and square.

That was not very complicated. It's Fundamental Analysis 101.

The second question, however, is actually pretty hard to answer. And it's also the most important.

Unacademy's "Series H" of $440M was "exclusively" advised by Avendus Capital. The round was led by Temasek, with participation from Softbank Vision Fund 2, Tiger Global, General Atlantic, and Mirae Asset. It also had Aroa Ventures (Ritesh Agarwal's family office) and Mr. Deepinder Goyal. The round followed "Series G", where Tiger, Dragoneer, Steadview and General Atlantic valued the company at $2B, back in January 2021.

What's to be noted is that this wasn't a seed round in a new company based entirely on gut feel and hope. It was a 6 Y/O company with the following numbers.

Year: Revenue/Loss (in Cr)

2018: ₹5/₹24

2019: ₹22/₹90

2020: ₹86/ ₹300

2021: ₹398/ ₹1537

As you can see, as its revenues rose, so did its losses, almost linearly. There's absolutely no way any financial model could've justified putting any money into UA at the time. What Chooran did founders (and Avendus) sell to all those investors?

Nothing matters more to us entrepreneurs than the answer to that question, I think. Hope we find it. Till then, let's pray (and slog).

Unacademy, after raising its Series H round of $440 Million in August 2021.

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