Microsoft partner Tech Avant-Garde seeks to raise Rs 300 crore to create digital classrooms in India

Microsoft’s global training partner in education, Tech Avant-Garde, is seeking to raise fresh capital of Rs 300 crore to transform thousands of existing classrooms into digital classrooms in western and northern India.

India has approximately 18-20 crore classrooms across 4 lakh private sector-owned schools and 14 lakh public schools waiting for digital transformation.

The country has around 2.7 crore teachers, who are the key to this digital transformation and holistic learning process.

The Covid-19 pandemic has changed the scenario and highlighted the need for digital transformation.

The company is seeking to tap a clutch of strategic investors including Private Equity (PE) majors.

Ali Sait, CEO, Tech Avant-Garde, said huge investments to the order of Rs 180 lakh crore are needed for this ambitious transformation.

The Tech Avant-Garde team is in touch with Mumbai-based investment bankers including the PSU investment banking firms.

According to Sait, in line with the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020, National Council of Educational Research & Training (NCERT) & Tech Avant-Garde (TAG) signed an agreement to collaborate for enhancing digital skills among the stakeholders of education so as to facilitate a Connected Learning Community (CLC).

Education Technology (Ed-Tech) in India is a $30 billion opportunity as per a recent report by RBSA Advisors. The Centre and the States will work together to increase the public investment in the Education sector to reach 6 per cent of GDP at the earliest as part of NEP 2020.

Tech Avant-Garde intends to cover around 100,000 schools in the first phase due to its MOUs with National Independent School Alliance (NISA), which has around 60,000 member schools; and AINACS (which has around 40,000 Catholic education institutions).

Union Minister of State for Tribal Affairs Renuka Singh has asked Tech Avant-Garde to focus on tribal regions of Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Odisha and Madhya Pradesh in particular, according to a statement.

NCERT, Tech Avant-Garde and Microsoft will collaborate to enhance Digital Transformation and Holistic Learning (DTHL) in education, as per Digital India Campaign and National Education Policy (NEP), 2020. Digital India campaign (2015) envisions to create basic IT/ ICT infrastructure, delivery of citizen services through portals, apps etc., and digital literacy of all citizens in a time bound manner.

TAG will provide Microsoft course content in the format shared by NCERT under the license CC-by-NC-SA. Certificate for the course will be jointly offered by NCERT and Microsoft/TAG as per NCERT format.

TAG in collaboration with CIET-NCERT will run customized courses for NCERT constituents such as: National Institute of Education (NIE), New Delhi[ Central Institute of Educational Technology (CIET), New Delhi; Pandit Sundarlal Sharma Central Institute of Vocational Education (PSSCIVE), Bhopal; Regional Institute of Education (RIE), Ajmer; Regional Institute of Education (RIE), Bhopal; Regional Institute of Education (RIE), Bhubaneswar; Regional Institute of Education (RIE), Mysore; and North-East Regional Institute of Education (NERIE), Shillong to name a few.

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