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Education continues to be an exciting sector for entrepreneurial ventures in India. The following chart shows the extent and frequency of the investments that were made in this sector by Private Equity investors (including Venture Capitalists) over the past few years.

Source: Venture Intelligence, Jan 2012

A recent poll conducted among various investors showed that education is one of the most favored sectors for investing.

Source: Venture Intelligence, Jan 2012

What makes education an exciting sector? Anything new?

In his comparison of India and China, Professor Yasheng Huang of MIT – an expert economist on India and China – calls out education (and thereby Human Capital) as one the top reasons why China is ahead.

Here is a link to Prof Huang’s recent presentation at TED. (Forward to 10:30 if you are pressed for time)

This presents a great opportunity for Indian entrepreneurs to have an impact on the Indian education ecosystem – be it K-12, Higher Education or Skills Development. The growing penetration of technology (mobile/tablet devices, internet, etc.) provides greater opportunity to reach out to millions of people and provide more personalized learning options (Khan Academy is pursuing a similar strategy in the US today). There are several opportunities to make the learning process an enjoyable experience. For example, social media tools can be leveraged to improve user interaction and promote group learning.

Why Edustars?

As of right now, in India there is no convenient platform for information sharing among the Education entrepreneurial community.

Edustars has been created to fill that particular need.

At a high level, Edustars aims to:

• Provide an online platform for information sharing
• Provide access to a world class mentoring team with deep domain expertise
• Periodically recognize outstanding startups with an “Edustar” award, thereby providing nationwide visibility
• Provide information from similar startups around the world with regard to their challenges and triumphs.

We welcome suggestions from education startups regarding any other venues wherein Edustars can add value and contribute towards your overall success.

I had the pleasure of participating in the MIT Enterprise Forum Bangalore's kick-off event last night. The topic for the night was "Education". The event was well attended and it was great to see the entrepreneurial energy and excitement among the participants around this sector.

I was asked to share my perspective on investing in education and so I put together a few slides on the topic. Post the event, I have received a handful of requests to share the presentation. And so, here it is (a cleaned up and shortened version). Obviously, without the verbal commentary this presentation only tells a partial story. But, happy to engage with entrepreneurs who share a mutual interest in improving the education ecosystem in India.

Investing in Indian Education Ecosystem