Byjus fires another 1000 disgracefully over WhatsApp calls

Despite providing reassurances to his employees over emails after firing 2500 employees last year that no more will be fired, Byju Raveendran fires an additional 1000 employees last week. The worst part was how the entire process took place. The lay off happened in a rather disgraceful manner where the victims were informed about their job loss not even via an email but via whatsapp calls. Some were informed about their job loss via whatsapp calls while some were asked by their managers to join a Google meet where they were informed about the unfortunate event and the exit process was commenced by the HR. The layoffs are part of a massive cost cutting exercise Byju’s initiated last year to streamline its operations at a time when digital K12 education businesses are finding it difficult to acquire new customers.An employee, Avinash (name changed) who was laid off in the current round said he missed a WhatsApp call from his team lead’s boss, on January 30, while he was on leave. “Within 24 hours, I learned that four of my colleagues had been laid off and that became six soon,” they said.Avinash later learned that their colleagues were all laid off on WhatsApp calls in the presence of the Vice President, a representative from the human resource department, and the director of the team. “They were informed that since the team is not generating enough revenues, they will have to be let go which is funny because generating revenue is not part of OKRs (objectives and key results) in the first place,” he added.Another employee, Deepti (name changed), corroborated the information Avinash shared and said that layoffs were being conducted over calls.Byjus’ inability to generate more sales and next round of funding triggered such a layoff bloodbath.The Prosus-backed company has been engulfed in controversies – ranging from misselling allegations to governance issues – over the past many months.Massive financial losses and mass layoffs have gripped Indian edtechs as demand for online-led education corrects from its peaks post-Covid.Among 52 startups that fired 17,989 employees across sectors in 2022, about 44% of the layoffs occurred within 15 edtech companies, as per Longhouse Consulting data shared exclusively with ET.These edtechs include Byju’s, Unacademy, Vedantu, Byju’s-owned WhiteHat Jr and Toppr, Practically, FrontRow, Lido, Invact Metaversity, Yellow Class, Teachmint, Lead, Udayy, Crejo.Fun and Eruditus.Online tutoring platform Vedantu in December dismissed 385 employees in its fourth round of layoffs in 2022 while test preparation platform Unacademy cut 350 jobs in November in its second tranche of layoffs in the year, bringing its total firing tally to 1,000.A funding winter in the meanwhile also led to a slump in overall edtech startup investments to $2.6 billion in 2022 from $4.1 billion in 2021. It was $2.3 billion in 2020.