Upskilling firm NxtWave raises $33 million in latest fundraising round

Hyderabad: Upskilling company NxtWave has raised $33 million in its latest fundraising round, led by Greater Pacific Capital (GPC), a leading international private equity firm. NxtWave’s existing venture investor Orios Venture Partners also participated in the current round.

Founded by IIT Bombay, IIT Kharagpur and IIIT Hyderabad alumni Sashank Reddy Gujjula, Anupam Pedarla, and Rahul Attuluri, NxtWave is building India’s largest online employability platform for new-age technology careers. The company has been extremely successful in creating job-ready tech professionals through its training programmes. Over the last couple of years, over 1,250 companies, from fast-growing startups to Fortune 500 giants, have hired thousands of NxtWave learners.

Commenting on the new funding, Rahul Attuluri, co-founder and CEO of NxtWave, said, “We’re excited to have GPC as a new partner in our journey. Making India a powerhouse of technologies starts with upskilling our youth. Together, we’ll bring high-quality, employability-focused education to India’s youth and equip them for the jobs of the future at scale. With NEP 2020, the Indian government has created a highly supportive environment for skill-based learning. This decade belongs to India.”

According to Morgan Stanley’s ‘Why this is India’s Decade’ report, India’s IT exports are expected to grow threefold in the next eight years, from $178 billion to $527 billion. This brings abundant career opportunities for India’s youth. NxtWave is bridging the widening industry-academia gap by providing career paths to these opportunities with an industry-relevant curriculum.

Ketan Patel, founder and CEO of GPC, commented, “India has world-class engineering institutes, and as the country positions itself as one of the leaders of the information era, the country needs to build the capacity to provide quality learning, particularly in Artificial Intelligence, for 500 million young Indians. Leveraging technology to fill this gap is the key to unlocking India’s economic potential and providing quality employment to its youth, which NxtWave is doing.”

He added, “We are excited to partner with NxtWave to rapidly scale its platform and provide access to high-quality education and training for India’s youth for this exciting global growth area.”

Nandan Desai, MD and co-head of India for GPC, will join NxtWave’s board as part of the transaction.

Speaking about the investment, Anup Jain, managing partner, Orios Venture Partners, said, “Nearly 63% of Indian graduates are unemployed and an estimated 30 lakh new tech jobs are projected to be created in India within a few years. This gap opens up a total tech-upskilling opportunity of over $8 billion annually. NxtWave has proved it can bridge this gap successfully and is now ready for its next phase of growth across India.”