AdmitKard, a Noida-based study abroad admissions startup, announced it has raised ₹10 crore ($1.3 million) in a Pre-series A funding round.
The round saw participation from the founders of renowned EdTech startups like Vamsi Krishna and Pulkit Jain of Vedantu, Mayank Kumar of upGrad, Gaurav Munjal, Roman Saini and Sumit Jain of Unacademy, Tanushree Nagori, Aditya Shankar and Ravi Shekhar of DoubtNut, and Akshay Saxena of Avanti. Others like Pankaj Chaddah (ex-Zomato), Suhail Sameer and Dhruv Dhanraj Bahl (BharatPe), Vijay Arisetty (MyGate), Anand Chandrasekaran (ex-Snapdeal, Facebook), Sameer Guglani (Morpheus Gang), BCG Partners, and MD of JPMorgan also participated in the round.
AdmitKard simplifies study abroad admissions through its platform, which is based on data-backed algorithms which suggest students the best possible universities according to their profile and preference. The startup helps students apply to thousands of universities and colleges in countries including the US, UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. With a unique “AI+Social” approach, AdmitKard uses an intelligent counseling assistant, and a network of current students to resolve the queries of the aspiring students.
The startup has created a strong community of international students and students looking to study abroad. It claims to have served students from 26 states in India and from other countries, including Sri Lanka, Nepal, Afghanistan, Nigeria, and Vietnam. AdmitKard also claims to have counseled over 25,000 students, processed around 12,000 applications and boasts of a strong portfolio of over 2,300 universities across the globe.
Commenting on the development, Piyush Bhartiya, Co-founder & CEO, AdmitKard, said,
"We have seen spectacular growth and kudos to our automation; we were able to handle them well. Now the focus is on growth and hence we would be raising a bigger round. This is more like a mentors and well-wishers round. We are fortunate to have credible names from EdTech sector itself and other marquee angels backing us today.”
According to the co-founder, AdmitKard has witnessed a 1,100% hike in the number of queries pouring in, and the company has touched an annual revenue run rate of $2 million in June 2021 and is on track to hit ARR of $8 million by March 2022.
Vamsi Krishna, Co-founder & CEO, Vedantu, commented on the funding,
“I have been a mentor to Rachit and Piyush for a long time now and have seen the journey of AdmitKard. Their focus on productizing student guidance and de-skilling the role of a counselor is a big win as it solves a very fundamental problem of talent quality and standardization at scale. I am happy to be a part of their growth journey.”
Ravi Shekhar, Co-founder, DoubtNut, also commented,
“AdmitKard has chosen the right category that has been waiting to be disrupted and addressing it with great service, unlocking desired value for students. The team is well placed to disrupt the space which is unorganized and dominated by offline players with a great PMF and strong plans to scale and hence have decided to back it.”
With the latest funding, AdmitKard has raised a total of $2.3 million to date. The startup had raised $1 million as part of the first tranche of its Pre-series A round in August 2019.
