Byju's has decided to go against its earlier plan of shutting its Thiruvananthapuram office. Yesterday, the company’s board met Pinarayi Vijayan, the chief minister (CM) of Kerala, following the backlash from various quarters.
After a prolonged session with the CM, the edtech unicorn has decided to hire 600 more employees across the state instead of laying off or relocating staff from the Thiruvananthapuram office.
“Following a detailed discussion between the Honourable Chief Minister of Kerala, Shri P. Vijayan and Byju Raveendran, Founder of BYJU'S, we have decided to continue operations of our TVM (Trivandrum) product development centre. As a result, our 140 associates will continue to operate from this centre,” a company spokesperson told Business Today.
Advertisement
As a part of its employee rationalisation process, India's highly valued edtech was considering shutting down its operations in Thiruvananthapuram and retrenching staffers. Anticipating this layoff, more than 100 employees met V Sivankutty, Kerala’s labour minister on October 25.
They sought compensation as well as pending salaries from the company. Posting the event on his social media, the labour minister assured workers of an elaborate inspection by his department.
Byju’s reported a massive loss of Rs 4,558 crore for the fiscal year 2021-2022, according to their audit reports. This was the primary reason for the company to go for cost-cutting measures, including a huge lay-off plan, and to keep the company on track for profitability.
Advertisement
Subsequently, the company announced a rationalisation plan involving 5 per cent of its 50,000-strong employees. This meant the possible termination of 2,500 employees in the coming months.
However, Byju Raveendran, founder and CEO of the company, penned an emotional text through an e-mail to his employees. “I am truly sorry to those who will have to leave Byju's," he wrote after apologising for the possible reduction in employee bandwidth. Multiple sources claimed that he had already asked the human resource team (HR) to look for different job roles for the employees who are going to receive pink slips.
