The other participants in the funding round were returning investors, the names of which the company declined to share in response to ET’s request for comment.
The Mumbai-based startup’s Series B round proposes to raise $20 million, the statement added.
The company, founded in 2019, had previously raised $5 million in a round dubbed pre-series B, from Suresh Pareek, founder and managing director of pharmaceutical company Ideal Cures, and Vikas Phadnis, co-founder of EuroKids through his vehicle Auctus Capital, among others.
What the funds will be used for
The freshly infused capital will help ASL expand its product offerings to meet the needs of students, universities, educators, and administrators, it said in a statement. It will also be used to build deeper partnerships in the United Kingdom, the European Union, Canada, Australia, and the United States.
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ASL is a unified student lifecycle management platform, assisting students in their application-to-accommodation journey with a digital-first approach. To date, the platform has helped over 500,000 students benefit, it claimed.
The international student education market, the statement added, is estimated to be worth $200 billion, with tuition fees (about 40%) and accommodation (about 25%) the largest categories. Globally, over 6-7 million students travel abroad for higher studies, the statement said.
In terms of scale, the company said UniScholars has placed students in over 100 universities worldwide, providing counselling and support services throughout the admissions process.
“Its hyper-personalised approach ensures that a student remains on the platform throughout its educational journey of 4-5 years and potentially expands into their early career as well. Its enterprise pricing model, recurring revenues and profitable unit economics excited us to be a part of their journey,” Vatsal Bavishi, investment director, CSVP Fund, said.
Education loans and student beds
UniCreds, an extended arm of UniScholars, has facilitated over $100 million in education loans through banking and non-banking financial company partners.
UniAcco, the other extended arm of UniScholars, offers an inventory of over 3.5 million student accommodation beds in the UK, EU, Canada, and Australia, working with property owners..
“Despite the economic challenges brought on by COVID-19, when many of our peers were struggling for survival, our business soared through the market turbulence and has achieved an impressive 300% y-o-y growth since then. We will continue to unify student journeys on our platform and strengthen our product portfolio across geographies.” Amit Singh, founder and CEO of ASL, said.
Singh, a former banker with Standard Chartered Asset Management and Aditya Birla Sun Life Mutual Fund, co-founded ASL with Sayantan Biswas, who previously founded branded rental homes startup Fella Homes.
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