As the funding winter hit EdTech start-ups and unicorns in India, Unacademy founders and management are taking pay cuts and employees will not get complimentary meals and snacks across its offices, the company's founder Gaurav Munjal told his employees.
In an internal email, Munjal said that, "we are not efficient at all," even though the company has more than Rs 2,800 crore in the bank, as stated in a report by IANS.
"We spend crores on travel for employees and educators. Sometimes it's needed, sometimes it's not. There are a lot of unnecessary expenses that we do. We must cut all these expenses. We have a strong core business. We must turn profitable ASAP," the email read.
The founder also told his employees, "We will be shutting down certain businesses that have failed to find the product market fit (PMF) like the Global Test Prep," in the email. Unacademy, last month, said that a small fraction of its workforce (2.6 per cent) has been asked to go as part of a performance improvement programme (PIP). In fact, nearly 150 employees from Unacademy's PrepLadder team were laid off.
In the email, Munjal also said that they have to do an Initial Public Offering (IPO) in the next two years. "And we have (to) turn cash flow positive. For that, we must embrace frugality as a core value," he added.
In April, Unacademy laid off nearly 600 employees, contractual workers and educators, about 10 per cent of its 6,000-strong workforce across the group.
