We’re excited to share that our portfolio company, byteXL, has raised $9 million in its Series B round, led by Elevar Equity, with participation from existing investors Kalaari Capital and the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation.

For Kalaari, this marks our first follow-on investment in byteXL since our Series A investment in 2024, and reflects our continued conviction in the team, the business and the opportunity to transform engineering education in India.

We congratulate Karun, Sricharan and the entire byteXL team on this important milestone.

The Opportunity: Closing India’s Engineering Skills Gap

India produces a large pool of engineering graduates every year, but the quality of education and exposure to industry varies dramatically across institutions.

The country’s elite engineering institutions represent only a small fraction of the overall ecosystem. The other ~99% of engineering colleges educate millions of students, many of whom have limited access to industry exposure, modern technology, experienced faculty and structured career pathways. 

At the same time, the technology industry continues to evolve rapidly.

AI, cloud computing, cybersecurity, full-stack development, DevOps and emerging technologies are changing the skills employers expect from graduates. Yet traditional engineering curricula and teaching environments often struggle to keep pace.

The result is a persistent gap:

Students graduate with a degree, but not necessarily with the skills, experience and career readiness that industry demands.

This is particularly consequential outside India’s major technology hubs, where students often have significantly less exposure to the broader technology ecosystem.

When we first invested in byteXL, we believed that improving employability for India’s engineering graduates required more than another learning platform or an additional skilling course. The opportunity was to work within the existing higher education system and make industry-relevant learning an integral part of the student’s four-year journey.

Why We Invested in byteXL

byteXL’s differentiated approach is its deep integration with engineering institutions.

Rather than treating skilling as an add-on, byteXL works with colleges to integrate industry-aligned curriculum, hands-on learning, trained educators, technology platforms, assessments and career preparation into the academic experience.

Its proprietary platform brings together learning content, coding environments, projects, assessments, student analytics and progress tracking, while its large educator ecosystem enables the model to be delivered at scale.

This creates a powerful combination of technology + academic integration + operational execution - allowing byteXL to work with institutions over multiple years rather than engaging with students only for a short-term course or placement programme.

We believed this model could create deeper institutional relationships, stronger student outcomes and a scalable business.

The progress since our Series A is increasingly validating that thesis.

Progress Since Our Series A Investment in 2024

When we invested in 2024, byteXL had partnered with 26+ colleges and universities and trained more than 100,000 students.

Since our initial investment, byteXL has made significant progress in turning that thesis into reality - building a scaled institutional model across India’s engineering colleges, reaching 2 lakh+ students, building a proprietary learning and project-development platform, developing a large educator ecosystem and demonstrating the ability to build a profitable business around the model.

byteXL has built a network of more than 3,000 educators, with 500+ certified educators, while continuing to invest in its proprietary learning platform and AI-led capabilities. Its product roadmap is increasingly focused on personalised learning, competency mapping, AI-enabled assessments and helping students move from learning concepts to demonstrating job-ready skills.  

The Road Ahead

With the fresh capital, byteXL plans to accelerate this trajectory.

The company intends to expand from 40 institutions to 120 institutions over the next two years, while increasing its reach from 2 lakh students to 5 lakh students across 15 states. 

The capital will be deployed towards:

• Expanding the institutional footprint across India

• Strengthening its AI and technology-led learning platform

• Building AI-enabled learning and assessment capabilities

• Expanding academic and delivery capabilities

• Developing new industry-aligned skilling programmes

The ambition is not simply to reach more students, but to build a technology and academic platform that can help a much larger number of engineering institutions deliver high-quality, industry-relevant education.

Karun Tadepalli, Co-Founder & CEO, byteXL, says:

“This fundraise is a strong validation of the growth we have built at byteXL and the confidence our investors have placed in our business and the long-term opportunity. Over the last few years, we have grown from establishing our model with engineering institutions to building a scalable business in the skilling space. The continued backing from our existing investors reflects their confidence in our execution and the strength of the opportunity ahead. As we enter our next phase of growth, our focus will be on expanding our institutional footprint, deepening our technology and AI capabilities, and building byteXL into a larger and more impactful player in India’s technology education ecosystem.”

Sampath P, Partner, Kalaari Capital, says:

“Our second round of investment in byteXL, reflects the conviction we have developed in both the team and the opportunity they are tapping. ​​byteXL’s differentiation lies in its unique model and proprietary technology platform, enabling it to work within the existing college system and make industry-relevant technology education a part of the student’s four-year journey, rather than an additional layer of training.​​ byteXL is able to address a large and underserved requirement by working within the existing engineering education ecosystem and not re-invent the wheel. Our confidence in byteXL also comes from rapid growth in business over the last few years and ​​its​ ability to achieve profitability.” ​  

Kalaari Capital is an early-stage, technology-focused venture capital firm based out of Bengaluru, India. Since 2006, Kalaari has empowered visionary entrepreneurs building unique solutions that reshape the way Indians live, work, consume and transact. The firm’s ethos is to partner early with founders and work with them to navigate the inevitable challenges of fostering ideas into successful businesses. At its core, Kalaari believes in building long-term relationships based on trust, transparency, authenticity, and respect.

If you are an entrepreneur (or know an entrepreneur) building a company in the EdTech space, please write to us at investments@kalaari.com

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