Airblack raises Rs 33 crore led by Micheal & Susan Dell Foundation

Skilling platform Airblack announced it has raised Rs 33 crore, led by the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation with participation from Elevation Capital, Info Edge Ventures, Blume Founders Fund, and Mars Shot VC.

Airblack also added a clutch of industry leaders as angel investors, including Sairee Chahal, Founder of SHEROES; Rahul Chaudhary, Co-founder of Treebo; Ritesh Malik, Founder of Plaksha; Mekin Maheswari, Founder of Udhyam; Vijay K. Thadani and Rajendra Singh Pawar, Co-founders of NIIT Group.

The funds raised will be used to launch new virtual offerings to cater to skilling requirements across more domains, launch new programmes and open hybrid learning centres in 10 cities over the next year where students from across geographies can enrol for high-quality learning experiences.

The company, which is focused on helping the ‘next 100 million Indians’ build livelihoods, has doubled down on its focus on driving student outcomes across Tier-I and Tier-II cities and emerged as a leading skilling player in the country with its focus on mobile-first delivery and learning-by-doing pedagogy, said the company in a statement.

Co-founded by Vaibhav Raj Gupta and Videt Jaiswal, Airblack is an outcome-focused skill learning platform, with courses accredited by the Government of India’s Beauty & Wellness Sector Skill Council and Skill India. With its focus on beauty upskilling, Airblack empowers women to become micro-entrepreneurs and get access to local jobs.

Since starting three years back, over 35,000 students in 300 cities have enrolled in Airblack courses.

“Our courses are designed to set our students up for real opportunities and start earning an independent livelihood. With this fundraise, expanding our impact through new courses and geographical presence, and becoming profitable will be our top priorities,” said Videt Jaiswal, Co-founder of Airblack.