The meteoric rise of Physics Wallah (PW) has made it an edtech unicorn and a household name for exam prep in India. Founder Alakh Pandey’s no-nonsense YouTube lectures and affordable courses won tons of students. Now, with a ₹3,820 crore IPO on the horizon, PW is celebrated as a beacon of accessible education. But behind the fanfare lurk troubling parallels with Byju’s, the edtech giant that soared to ~$22 billion valuation and then collapsed under scandal. Analysts and insiders warn that PW’s financial trajectory, aggressive acquisition spree, opaque governance and workforce turmoil echo the very missteps that brought Byju’s down.
In short, the alarm bells are ringing: are the same patterns repeating? Let’s compare PW’s situation against Byju’s history, and see whether Physics Wallah might follow Byju’s steps?
The Byju’s Precedent: Frenzied Acquisitions and Collapse
Byju Raveendran’s edtech empire, Byju’s, was once India’s darling tech startup. From 2017–21 Byju’s went on a shopping spree, acquiring 17 companies in five years. Byju’s poured roughly $3 billion into these deals, yet most of the acquired businesses never turned profitable. Indeed, only a few assets showed any gains. Byju’s aggressive M&A strategy backfired as the company reported a massive ₹8,500 crore loss in FY2022 and its overall financial health deteriorated drastically.
Byju’s troubles ran deeper than acquisitions. A year-long government probe found “no evidence” of fraud or fund siphoning at Byju’s, but flagged serious corporate governance lapses. Nominee directors even resigned in protest over lack of transparency. By mid-2024, the once-$22 billion company was essentially worth nothing: global investor Prosus wrote off nearly $493 million of its Byju’s stake. Multiple lawsuits, unpaid debts and insolvency proceedings engulfed the firm (Byju’s now faces insolvency and unresolved $1 billion dues). In short, Byju’s went from Silicon Valley sensation to nothing, leaving a trail of disgruntled educators, regulators and investors.
This fate of unchecked growth and then dramatic downfall raises the question: Could Physics Wallah be headed the same way?
Physics Wallah’s Stellar Growth (and Rising Concerns)
Physics Wallah’s origin story captured India’s imagination. Alakh Pandey began in 2014 teaching physics for free on YouTube, then co-founded PW (with Prateek Boob) in 2020. By mid-2022, after a $100 million funding round, PW hit “unicorn” status with a valuation of $1.1 billion”. It expanded rapidly. By February 2025, the PW app had been downloaded over 10 million times and the YouTube channel surpassed 13.3 million subscribers. Praised as a grassroots “Robinhood” of education, PW built hundreds of “Vidyapeeth” centres (physical coaching hubs) alongside its online programs.
Yet newly filed financials paint a more ominous picture. PW’s DRHP (Draft Red Herring Prospectus) discloses a string of heavy losses. In FY 2023, PW lost ₹84.08 crore. The next year, that ballooned to ₹1,131.13 crore. In FY 2025, losses narrowed to ₹243.26 crore, a dramatic cut but still a loss. In other words, three consecutive years in the red, with FY2024 being by far the worst loss in company history.
This skid coincided with PW’s acquisition binge and expansion push. On the surface, revenues surged (from ₹772 crore in FY23 to ₹1,940.7 cr in FY24 and nearly ₹2,887 cr in FY25). That 49% jump in FY25 revenue looks impressive. But analysts note this boost came largely from consolidating recent acquisitions; the DRHP does not break out how much growth was organic versus from new subsidiaries. Without those deals, true underlying growth is opaque.
PW’s claim to hypergrowth is inseparable from its M&A strategy, just as it was for Byju’s. But whereas Byju’s massive investments led to catastrophic write-downs, PW has so far masked the details. As we will see, the early signs for PW’s deals are troubling.
Acquisition Spree: Entering New Markets, or Digging a Hole?
Like Byju’s before it, Physics Wallah has gone on a shopping spree to enter new segments. In just the past few years PW snapped up or partnered with a flurry of startups. For example, Utkarsh Classes (for government exam prep), iNeuron (tech upskilling), Knowledge Planet (K-12 tuition), FreeCo (doubt-solving forums), Xylem Learning (hybrid JEE/NEET prep) and PenPencil (edtech SaaS). It also took minority stakes in Sheryians (a coding school) and a 40% stake in Sarthi IAS (UPSC prep). In its IPO filings PW even reserves funds for more “future acquisitions”. This laundry list of buys mirrors Byju’s past (17 deals), and raises the same question that can PW successfully integrate all these units?
So far the answer seems “not without pain.” Early acquisitions have underperformed. iNeuron, a tech certification platform acquired for about ₹250 crore, appears moribund. PW’s auditors note iNeuron had no active employees or operations by FY2025, living only on “legacy content”. The company was forced to write off the iNeuron investment impairing ₹54.4 crore of goodwill in FY25 (triggering a ₹71.2 crore exceptional loss). In plain terms, PW effectively lost its entire bet on iNeuron.
Another acquisition, PrepOnline (a NEET/JEE prep platform), has similarly soured. Industry reports indicate PrepOnline’s sales collapsed, forcing PW to mark down that investment. (Business Standard noted PW acquired PrepOnline in 2022, but FY25 filings show no success story there, implying an impairment.) Likewise, Knowledge Planet (an edtech firm based in the UAE) has turned litigious as its founders recently sued PW over the deal.
In contrast, some deals like Xylem or Utkarsh have clearer strategic fits. But the overall picture is worrisome. Physics Wallah is rushing into deals, then struggling to derive value. The company’s own filings candidly acknowledge the risk, noting that “acquisitions are not plain maths”. Yet PW has not offered clear transparency on deal performance.
For comparison, Byju’s also faced acquisition woes. In its July 2024 probe report, regulators calculated Byju’s had spent ₹9,025 crore on acquisitions from 2014–22 but only earned ₹4,287 crore back, essentially burning half of every rupee. PW’s numbers are smaller scale, but the principle is the same where unchecked acquisitions without integration can destroy value.
Financial Reality Check: Red Ink and Big Bills
Beyond acquisitions, PW’s losses come from vanilla operational burn and expansion costs. The company is aggressively opening offline centres (dubbed “Vidyapeeths”), building tech infrastructure and marketing in a hyper-competitive market. Direct expenses in FY25 jumped 35% to ₹513 crore, driven by faculty fees and support services. Even book and merchandise sales (a sideline) grew, but the net result remains heavily negative.
Critically, PW’s losses today exceed any profits. (The company did note a positive EBITDA in FY2025, but that masked massive non-cash write-offs and finance expenses.) It burned cash. Raised ₹1,562.9 cr ($210M) in FY24, yet ended FY25 with a lower cash balance than it reported in the interview. At June 30, 2025 PW had only $183M (~₹1,562 cr) in treasury, not the $280–300M touted by the founder in media interviews. In other words, PW actually spent ~$61M (₹543 cr) of the fresh funding – a cash burn – contrary to the founder’s “cash-generating” narrative.
This cash-gap isn’t illegal, but it underlines that Physics Wallah is far from profitable. Management promises that by FY2026-27 they will turn the corner, but even the prospectus admits that profitability is some distance away. (Paytm Money analysis notes PW’s FY25 PAT margin was –8.43% and RoNW –12.5%.) All told, the “numbers tell a different story” than the marketing pitch of hypergrowth and cash flow.
Faculty Exodus: Quality at Risk
An equally alarming trend is in the ranks of PW’s educators, which is its core asset. The IPO filing quietly discloses very high attrition. Faculty turnover jumped from 18.0% in FY2023 to a staggering 40.4% in FY2024, before easing to about 27.0% in FY2025. In other words, one in every three physics/chemistry/math teachers hired in FY24 left within the year. Overall employee attrition (including back-office) hit 45.3% in FY24, nearly half the workforce.
Such churn is nearly unheard-of outside startups in crisis. Physics Wallah’s management excuses it as integration pains from acquisitions, but insiders say the reality is a “talent war.” Many star instructors are leaving to launch their own coaching centers or join rivals. Reports indicate entire subject teams jumping ship – five top JEE/NEET teachers left together in 2023, and eleven GATE instructors left en masse in 2024. (Adda247 and other platforms are aggressively poaching.) For a company built on star teachers, losing so many at once is a clear red flag. When students buy Physics Wallah subscriptions largely for Alakh Pandey’s and team’s teaching, brain drain undermines its brand.
Byju’s faced a similar crisis earlier. A cult of star teachers who felt squeezed by its centralized culture, and a frenzy of new hires that burned out. A cohort of ex-physics wallah tutors even launched an independent channel (“Sankalp Bharat”) in 2023 to air grievances. Today, those behind-the-scenes brewing issues are one reason the student retention suffered. Physics Wallah may encounter the same reputation risk if word gets out: “We’re losing our best teachers” could become a tagline for disgruntled kids.
Governance and Transparency Under Scrutiny
A frequent criticism leveled at Byju’s was its opaque, insider-driven governance. Many founders and early employees held official roles that sparked questions. Physics Wallah is starting to look similar. The company remains tightly controlled by its two cofounders. They hold 40.35% stake each (80.7% total) pre-IPO. Other big investors like WestBridge and Lightspeed have only single-digit stakes. In fact, PW’s IPO is structured so that all share sales are by the founders. Each will sell up to ₹360 cr of their holding. No other stakeholders are offering shares.
Moreover, PR filings hint that family members occupy senior roles. (For example, public filings name Alakh’s mother in the “Founder’s Office,” and Prateek’s sisters as Finance Controller and Tech Director.) While this is not forbidden, it flies in the face of professional corporate governance norms. Independent directors have only recently been added to the board (two ex-bureaucrats and one ex-CFO), after years of founder-centric leadership. We worry that close-knit management could repeat the “we’ll fix it ourselves” ethos that plagued Byju’s internal decision-making.
Finally, Physics Wallah’s IPO documents show surprisingly little detail for a company raising thousands of crores from public investors. The Red Herring Prospectus gives broad goals (expand offline centres, upgrade tech, etc.) but lacks specifics on student metrics or how recent acquisitions actually performed. When questions arise, such as how many students came from the Utkarsh Classes joint venture, or the exact drag from iNeuron, the filings are mostly silent. Byju’s, in contrast, faced severe criticism for lack of transparency (the MCA probe noted “non-deliberation on important policies”). Physics Wallah may not yet face regulators, but the echoes are there.
The IPO Roadshow: Overhangs and Warnings
Physics Wallah’s IPO is structured to rake in fresh capital, but even its IPO filings send mixed signals. The company aims to raise ₹3,100 crore via new shares, plus ₹720 crore from the founders selling old shares. The plan is to spend this on new centres, tech upgrades, content and even “future acquisitions”; hardly reassuring given recent write-offs. Notably, PW intends to pour ₹710 cr into marketing alone, highlighting continued hype efforts.
From an investor’s view, another risk looms, which is a share overhang. Though PW’s founders won’t sell more than planned (and remain locked in on the rest of their holdings), large early backers are presently locked by regulation. Heavyweights like WestBridge, Lightspeed and GSV hold significant stakes (WestBridge ~6.4%, Lightspeed ~1.8%, etc.). None have indicated selling now, but once their mandatory lock-in expires (typically a year from listing), even a small percentage offload could flood the market. An influx of supply could crash the share price, which is a classic overhang scenario.
Controversies and Whistleblowers
Byju’s saga was also marked by aggressive tactics against critics and internal dissent. Physics Wallah isn’t immune from controversy. Independent educators have alleged that PW uses legal pressure on detractors. For instance, YouTuber Nikhil Kumar Singh claims PW hit him with multiple copyright strikes after he posted candid NEET exam analyses. Singh portrays himself as a student-first whistleblower, and feels the strikes are intimidation rather than legitimate copyright enforcement. While facts are disputed, such incidents echo concerns about stifling criticism – a strategy once (wrongly) blamed on Byju’s as well.
Separately, there have been murmurs about marketing claims versus reality. In media interviews (e.g. Business Standard’s Udisha in Nov 2025), Pandey said Physics Wallah has raised $210 million so far and maintains a $280–300 million cash pile, implying strong cash-generation. But the DRHP data (FY2025) tell a different story where the company actually raised ~$244M (about 16% more than claimed) and shows only $183M in treasury. In effect, PW burned roughly $61M (₹543 cr) of investor funds in that period, contrary to the founder’s claim of being net cash-positive. If nothing else, this mismatch has raised eyebrows in investor circles. This fine print contradicts the founder’s soundbites.
We emphasize these issues not as rumor but to highlight that sleight-of-hand and selective storytelling can hide risks. In Byju’s case, investors later uncovered that many rosy public statements obscured mounting losses and opaque disclosures. PW’s impending IPO will expose its DRHP to scrutiny and markets have short memories for credibility gaps.
The Bigger Picture: Strain in Indian Edtech
Physics Wallah’s drama is playing out against a turbulent backdrop for India’s edtech sector. The pandemic-driven boom has cooled. Unacademy and Vedantu (two of PW’s largest competitors) laid off thousands in 2023 and early 2024 as funding slowed. Investors grew wary of profits a decade away, focusing instead on proven models. Meanwhile, regulators and parents have become more demanding on outcomes and ethics. Byju’s legal battles (no-bid admissions, refund policies, etc.) scarred the industry’s reputation.
Crucially, students and families have started valuing profitability and trust as much as scale. Physics Wallah was long seen as the “good guy” for its affordable fees; but raising thousands of crores from public markets means Physics Wallah must prove it isn’t just burning cash to grab share. The RHP shows Physics Wallah trying to straddle both online and physical coaching, a hybrid model that requires heavy investment. PW pledges to “strengthen governance” and expand affordable education (albeit in a press release manner). But actions speak louder than words.
Byju’s collapse has instilled caution that no longer will the market blindly reward eyeballs. Any hint that Physics Wallah is reprising Byju’s aggressive M&A blitz and opaque culture could spook investors and students alike.
At the end: A Warning from History
Physics Wallah is a homegrown edtech powerhouse with an inspiring origin story and an army of students. Yet the parallel patterns are striking. Like Byju’s, PW has delivered eye-catching growth statistics and billion-dollar funding, while quietly amassing red ink, debt, and internal strife. As it steps onto the public stage, the numbers and risks are now out in the open. Will PW turn its brand loyalty into sustainable profits? Or will it crash under the weight of unprofitable acquisitions, governance lapses, and overexpansion – just as Byju’s did?
Investors and the public should ask when Physics Wallah says it “burns cash to drive growth,” how much of that growth is real? When insiders call it “family-run,” how independent will its leadership be? If the teacher exodus hints at bigger problems, will PW be transparent about fixing them? In short, history has given physics wallah a Formula: run the same experiment as Byju’s, and you risk the same outcome.
By unearthing these details and calling out the warning signs with data-backed analysis, we aim not to be alarmist, but to remind stakeholders that numbers don’t lie. The next few quarters will be telling. Physics Wallah has a chance to correct course by professionalizing governance, shoring up its balance sheet, and delivering on promises. If it doesn’t, the label “Next Byju’s” might become a reality more concerning than anyone wants to admit.
