01-07-2025
English learning startup SpeakX looks to raise $15 million
English language learning startup SpeakX is looking to raise a new round of capital of up to $15 million, two people familiar with the matter told Mint.
Existing investor Elevation Capital has already closed its cheque to the company, they added.
Other participants include US-based consumer tech VC firm Goodwater Capital and global investment firm WestBridge Capital.
'The company is raising money because building their AI requires significant capital,' one of the two people said.
SpeakX, a voice-first learning platform that uses AI to teach conversational English, will use the funds primarily for expanding its engineering team and product development, especially in agentic artificial intelligence (AI).
'Personalization is what they're going for, which is why they need custom AI agents for every user,' the person added.
The edtech operates on a subscription model, charging users ₹ 300 per month. Many of its users come from tier-2 and tier-3 cities, and it sees a lot of traction from users in lower-income groups.
The company claims to be profitable with annual recurring revenue of $7 million and an Ebitda run rate of $3 million. Ebitda is short for earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization.
People from India's smaller cities are gravitating towards learning English for better job opportunities, especially as multinational companies set up global capacity centres in satellite towns.
This will be SpeakX's first fundraising since its 2023 pivot to English language learning from being a hobby classes platform, YellowClass, for 3- to 12-year-old children.
Its founder, Arpit Mittal, had raised a total of $7.3 million: $1.3 million in seed funding led by India Quotient and then a $6 million Series-A round led by Elevation Capital with participation from Titan Capital and First Cheque, according to startup data intelligence platform Tracxn.
This is Mittal's third run as a founder, having previously founded property search platform Roofpik and edtech startup Edcited, which was acquired by Co-Cubes, an online assessment and hiring company.
Even though edtech as a sector has been experiencing a downturn in the wake of Byju's collapse and Unacademy's struggles, venture capital is increasingly betting on personalized education with AI.
Recently, voice-first tutor Stimuler raised $3.5 million in a pre-Series A funding round led by Lightspeed and SWC Global. Edtech startup secured $9.5 million in seed funding from The House Fund and GSV Ventures.
In fact, the latter had told Mint in December 2024 that it was warming up to Indian edtech companies once more.
