Prosus, Byju’s largest and earliest shrareholder has made a drastic slash in its stake to a much smaller $5.1 billion.
Prosus announced on Tuesday that it had reduced its 9.6% stake in the Indian edtech giant to about $493 million at the end of the financial year in March.
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This figure is merely a shadow of the much larger $6 billion at which Prosus had valued Byju’s as recently as November 2022.
Of a greater concern is the fact that the amount is a massive drop from the $22 billion valuation at which Byju has developed a number tranches of funding in the one and a half year.
This markdown occurs at a time when the giant Indian startup is struggling with multiple with challenges.
Some of the challenges are legal battle with lenders, withdrawal of global auditing firm Deloitte, and resignation of board members.
Peak XV Partners, Chan Zuckerberg Initiative and Prosus said late last week that their representatives had resigned from the board of Byju’s.
The resignation of the board members took place not long after Deloitte told the Byju’s board that it was relieving itself from its position with the Indian startup.
Deloitte, which was to partner with Byju’s until 2025, said that the edtech giant had failed to hand over financial results following the March 2022 financial year ending.
In its Tuesday annual report, Prosus admitted it had lost “significant influence” in Byju’s in this year “due to the loss of board representation.”
In addition to being one of the biggest shareholders of Byju’s, Prosus is also one of the oldest.
Its stake, which has raised more than $6 billion, has never been sold to date. Also, a number of other Byju’s shareholders have downsized their stakes.
Byju’s co-founder and CEO, Byju Raveendran, has been making efforts to on secure a notably large funding round to sate his existing investors.
It was reported last month that Byju’s was in talks with sovereign wealth funds and other investors, with plans to secure up to $950 million.
The chief financial officer of Byju’s pledged to summarize the auditing for the financial year ending March 2022 by September this year and that of 2023 by December.
Raveendran also promised shareholders that he wanted a smoother transition for board members and acknowledged the unexpected departure of Deloitte.
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In a bid to calm the concerns, he stated that he was totally committed to Byju’s, having pumped in hundreds of millions of dollars of loans as well as personal funds into the company.
“Byju’s is not my work; it is my life,” he stated.
