Edtech firm upGrad’s corporate skilling and workforce development division has onboarded five senior leaders across various domains.
These new appointments further bolster upGrad’s leadership team, which has grown significantly over the past year with strategic hires.
The appointments for upGrad Enterprise division happened over the last few months. Shirin Rai Gupta was appointed to lead the brand and marketing efforts, Mayank Manohar is driving the strategic expansion of the study abroad vertical, and Harshal Goyal is spearheading talent solutions.
In addition, Dikshit Jain and Narasimha Jagarlapudi are driving sales excellence and leading the scaling of cross-functional and corporate sales, technical sales enablement, data-driven sales solutions, and strategic bid management.
“We have charted out a high-growth plan for upGrad Enterprise, and these strategic appointments mark a significant segue into our next phase of growth,” Srikanth Iyengar, CEO of upGrad Enterprise, said in a statement.
“The arrival of these leaders perfectly complements our brand and expansion strategy, as we strengthen our focus on profitable high growth,” he added.
Back in March, the Mumbai-based company appointed Shailesh Mahale as corporate HR head and Kumar Anshu as head of human resources for the working professional, study abroad, and offline segments.
In the same month, upGrad appointed Venkatesh Tarakkad as its first chief financial officer. In February, Ankur Nyati was named president of its study abroad segment, succeeding Ankur Dhawan, who will assume a new role.
At the beginning of 2024, upGrad appointed CP Gurnani, the former CEO and MD of Tech Mahindra, as an independent non-executive director to its Board. This was preceded by Asheesh Sharma’s appointment as president of short courses and boot camps at upGrad.
In 2023, upGrad made strategic leadership appointments, hiring Ipshita Kajla as HR head for upGrad Abroad, Avnish Datt as Chief Business Officer at upGrad Harappa, along with Raj Dogra as Chief Information Officer and Rajiv H Singh as Vice President for new initiatives.
In June this year, the Mumbai-based edtech unicorn raised Rs 287.5 crore in debt from the Singapore-headquartered EvolutionX Debt Capital. The proceeds from the debenture issuance are intended for growth capital, funding operating expenses, and general corporate purposes.
Founded in 2015 by Ronnie Screwvala, Mayank Kumar, and Phalgun Kompalli, upGrad operates across various educational sectors, encompassing test preparation, study abroad programmes, undergraduate degrees, and courses in collaboration with over 300 university partners.
In FY23, upGrad recorded a revenue of Rs 1,194 crore, up 96.4% from the previous financial year’s Rs 608 crore, while its losses widened 76% to Rs 1,141 crore as opposed to Rs 648 crore in the prior year.
