Byju's Final Payments to Laid-off-Staff Delayed Till November, Email says (Image: x.com/@ByjusSupport)
Byju’s, the edutech, has emailed its staff about the delay in payments of their dues to November 17 from the earlier set September 15, 2023. The full and final settlements of dues to their laid-off staff has been delayed because of the strapped-up liquidity situation that the company has been facing for some time.
Earlier in June this year, Byju’s had initiated a reduction in workforce which the company called a strategic step towards attaining profitability. This had impacted about 1000 employees of the company, spanning over, mentoring, training, sales, post-sales and finance departments. While being laid-off, the employees were told that their salary for months of June, July, with additional incentives would be settled by September 15, but now, through an email, the company has delayed the payments time till November 17th, reported moneycontrol.
The email to the laid-off staff read, “this is to inform you that the full and final settlement amount will be released latest by 17th November 2023,” and that, “we are sorry for the inconvenience caused,” reported the moneycontrol. A Byju’s spokesperson also said, “we regret and acknowledge the delays in settling dues of former employees. As we work through a difficult business restructuring, we are committed to meeting all our obligations as soon as possible.”
The company had recently laid down a proposal to its lenders on repayment. The company had expressed its intention to repay in full, its $ 1.2 billion term loan B within the coming six months. This, the company plans to achieve with an initial payment of $300 million, in 3 months.
Byju”s which had a good stead initially has lost the steam after being embroiled in violations of foreign exchange rules. With the tides coming down, resignation of their staff could be seen, one such instance was the resignation of its VP, Cherian Thomas last month. Earlier, there have been allegations against the company on hiding $533 million on a lesser known entity, on this the company said that they have not been served any summons. In order to pay the loans, the company has undertaken a strategic review of its assets. Its upskilling platform – Great Learning and book reading – Epic, has been put up for sale which could bring in about $ 1 billion into the company. With the funding plans moving along, there are reports of middle-east based sovereign wealth funds expressing interest, money control reported. There are also negotiations going on with an US based management company, Davidson Kempner which had lent $ 250 million in May through a structured case, where it was based on future cash receipts of Aakash Educational Services, which is Byju’s greatest asset. There have been instances where the negotiations have not gone well too, in the case of negotiations with the US AMC, the negotiations had fallen apart.
