India’s anti-money laundering investigation agency conducted searches at offices of Byju’s, the country’s most valuable startup, as part of a probe and has seized documents.
(Bloomberg) — India’s anti-money laundering investigation agency conducted searches at offices of Byju’s, the country’s most valuable startup, as part of a probe and has seized documents.
The Enforcement Directorate officials, mandated to investigate money laundering and forex violation cases, searched the Bengaluru-based startup’s offices and seized documents and digital data, the agency said in a Twitter post. The probe is happening under Foreign Exchange Management Act, it said.
The investigations come at a time when the company, valued at $22 billion, is in talks with investors to raise funds for tiding over a liquidity crunch. The firm had also been trying to appease creditors seeking restructuring of a $1.2 billion term loan after the once high-flying startup missed deadlines to file financial accounts for the year to March 31, last year.
“We have been completely transparent with the authorities and have provided them with all the information they have requested,” a spokesperson for Byju’s said in an e-mailed statement. “We will continue to work closely with the authorities to ensure that they have all the information they need, and we are confident that this matter will be resolved in a timely and satisfactory manner.”
Byju Raveendran, a son of educators, founded his eponymous startup in 2015. The firm, whose parent company is formally known as Think & Learn Pvt, is the largest of a crop of startups that over the past decade have thrived on India’s growing mobile connections and foreign investments.
(Updates with more details from third paragraph)
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