Khaitan & Co advised upGrad Education Pvt Ltd in its 100% acquisition of Sorting Hat Technologies Pvt Ltd (Unacademy) for a total consideration of USD 205 million.
One of the largest consolidations in the EdTech space and first unconditional approval from CCI involving two India-based ed-tech players, cleared based on submissions demonstrating competitive constraints from a range of alternatives (including AI-based learning tools) reflecting the CCI’s forward-looking approach to assessing competitive alternatives.
The Firm advised on the structuring related aspects of the transaction from Indian foreign exchange laws and competition laws aspects; (b) conducted a legal due diligence on Sorting Hat Technologies Pvt Ltd and its subsidiaries; (c) secured an unconditional approval of the transaction from the Competition Commission of India; and (d) assisted in the negotiation and finalisation of the transaction documents.
Competition / Antitrust: Pranjal Prateek (Partner), Alisha Mehra (Principal Associate), Toshika Soni (Associate), Ritika Ghosh (Associate) and Joshua Kurien George (Associate);
Corporate & Commercial: Chirag Mangal (Principal Associate), Jubin Jay (Principal Associate), Aditi Gupta (Senior Associate), Daanish Dube (Senior Associate), Shivangi Mishra (Associate), Akanksha Agrahari (Associate), Laksh Sharma (Associate), Sameer Parihar (Associate), Shriya Garg (Associate), Devika Garg (Associate), Umang Agarwal (Associate) and Divyanshu Sharma (Associate)
Employment, Labour & Benefits: Abhinav Rastogi (Partner), Shabnam Shaikh (Partner) and Ajeta Anand (Senior Associate)
Intellectual Property: Shailendra Bhandare (Partner) and Vaishali Adhikari (Senior Associate)
Privacy and Data Protection: Supratim Chakraborty (Partner) and Shramana Dwibedi (Principal Associate)
The core team consisted of Monika Srivastava (Partner), Sanchit Agarwal (Partner), Jubin Jay (Principal Associate), Chirag Mangal (Principal Associate), Shubhang Upadhyay (Senior Associate) and Deepansh Goyal (Senior Associate)