Unacademy Appoints Pratik Dalal as CFO for Offline Centres

• ByStartupStory     |    January 17, 2024

Unacademy, a Bengaluru-based edtech unicorn, has appointed Pratik Dalal as the chief finance officer (CFO) of its offline business – Unacademy Centres. The announcement was made by Unacademy cofounder and CEO Gaurav Munjal in an internal message. Munjal expressed confidence in Dalal’s diverse experience across corporate banking, fintech, and consumer internet, highlighting his ability to deliver financial success for businesses.

Pratik Dalal joins Unacademy from the Kunal Shah-led fintech unicorn CRED, where he served as the head of finance. His previous roles include positions at Flipkart and Ola Cabs, demonstrating a strong background in the industry.

This development follows the resignation of Unacademy’s previous CFO, Subramanian Ramachandran, almost three months ago. Unacademy has witnessed several key exits in the last two years, including high-level executives such as Arnab Dutta, Vivek Sinha, Abhyudaya Singh Rana, Siddharth Manchanda, Tina Balachandran, Sachin Aggarwal, Karan Shroff, and Ashish Arora.

Despite these changes, Unacademy has managed to reduce its cash burn, with the unicorn’s consolidated net loss decreasing by 41% to INR 1,678.1 Cr in FY23 from INR 2,847.9 Cr in the previous fiscal year. Operating revenue also increased by 26% to INR 907 Cr in FY23 from INR 719.2 Cr.

In November last year, Unacademy appointed Sandhydeep Purri as its new chief people officer (CPO). Gaurav Munjal recently announced on X (formerly Twitter) that the startup slashed its cash burn by 60% in 2023, achieving a cash runway of four months. He noted a 30% degrowth in the startup’s online business in 2023 but highlighted an 87% improvement in EBITDA. Additionally, Unacademy Centres saw its learners grow to 32,000 in 2023 from 6,000 in 2022, and the Graphy vertical was on the verge of achieving profitability.

Founded in 2015 by Gaurav Munjal, Roman Saini, and Hemesh Singh, Unacademy boasts a network of 91K registered educators and over 99 Mn learners. The startup has raised over $800 Mn and counts Temasek, Elevation Capital, Tiger Global, and SoftBank among its backers.

Follow Startup Story