IXAMBEE: CRAFTING BETTER ECONOMY WITH ONLINE “LEARNING” COURSES

IXAMBEE: CRAFTING BETTER ECONOMY WITH ONLINE "LEARNING" COURSES

India, a country that is set to become the youngest country by 2020 is also the one where thousands of young aspirants from small towns visit the megacities to beat the existing competition in competitive exams for government jobs. In an era, where the internet has been revolutionizing various industries, a business leader, Chandraprakash Joshi along with his co-founders created Ixambee, an online learning platform to provide young aspirants with a platform to learn, grow and excel in the SSC, Railways, Teaching, RBI, SBI, and LIC jobs exams.

One of its kind, the brand does not offer mock test as its marketed products but offers the youth intending to get government jobs with a platform to study, prepare irrespective of their social status.

"Targeted at the middle-class, lower middle class, and a large number of students coming from TS2, TS3 towns and we are providing them with two products. The first offering is a mock test and the second is a video-based learning course." Chandraprakash Joshi

 Since the examination system has shifted from the traditional written exams to a computerized setup, Ixambee offers students with mock tests (stimulation of the real exam) in an updated environment. The students reach the centre where they are provided with a computer to attempt a mock test which normally consists of general awareness, reasoning, English, quantitative aptitude along with specific subjects like agriculture, insurance, law or IT.

With the core focus on learning, unlike its competitors in the market which offers only mock tests, Ixambee is a platform where one can not only test their aptitude but also prepare for the exam with videos based content. For every exam and subject, the platform has a set of short video content prepared, pre-recorded by the faculty. Every topic has a 10 to 20 or more videos depending on the length of the topic. Ixambee is exactly what every student dreams of while looking for coaching as the brand also offers notes for revision, many practice questions and live sessions with experts, especially for doubt clarification.

Every student at Ixambee receives 3 free mock tests along with the learning course content and notes to prepare for the competitive exams. Bridging the gap between the aspirants and their bright future is the Ixambee Team that puts the same efforts as the students for their better future.

Key Differentiators for Ixambee

• Free Mock Tests: Ixambee offers mock tests for 50 exams for free.
• Crisp Content: The content at Ixambee is crisp with an average time of 7 minutes or 7 pages arranged in difficulty level from concept to high-level.
• Indian English Based Content: The questions and answer exclamations are in Indian English, the language used in exams.
• Customised Content: Ixambee offers curated and customized content according to the student's requirements.

Internet: Key Factor in Industry Revolution

Established as a distinct brand from the already existing companies in the market, the brand was created with the idea of being a 'learning company'. The companies established years before the brand entered the market in December 2016 were focused on only selling the mock tests, rather creating a space where the target audience can 'learn'.

"There are various companies in the market which receive around 90 % of the revenue from selling the mock test. We started as a learning company and the mock tests became our 'free product' so that users can visit the website and experience the quality of the content at Ixambee", CEO Chandraprakash Joshi shares his views on mock tests as a free product.

With increased access to the internet, the brand was not only able to reach the students in locations like Delhi but also cater to the students who migrate from small towns to receive a good quality coaching that is not available in their cities like Haridwar, Meerut, Jaunpur, or any other small city.

Chandraprakash believes that the credit for success to their brand also goes to the data availability in small places. He said "In the various specific location of Delhi, more than 1 lakh students have come to Delhi only for attending the SSC and banking coaching, and for other exams like UPSC, the number is separate. Since they don' t have access to good coaching in their hometown they have to migrate to the big city but now with the quality content available online with Ixambee, people are starting to learn online."

He added "Today we launch a video and it can reach the student immediately. The data availability has made the biggest change in the industry; people who have been doing only testing have been shifting to the learning sticking at their native place."

Competition, a Growth Booster

With a good number of companies available as its competition, the brand believes that competition leads the brand to grow. A good number of players as competition allows the brand to know that the market exists and holds potential. It also helps the brand in 'being on the edge' and aware of the fact that 'if we are not going to do it someone else will' which creates a constant scope for working towards better quality services."

Chandraprakash sees competition in a different light as he believes that "Being the second-movers in the market, we always wish to present strong competition to the existing players in the market as they have to be much more careful watching us."

The Content Team

Ixambee has two teams for creating content including an in-house team and a team working from remote. Arunima, a co-founder of Ixambee who worked in the coaching industry for 7 years leads the in-house team to create content for mock test, whereas the video content which requires expertise on subjects like agriculture, law, IT, security markets is created by the experts working from remote.

The brand finds these experts from different platforms who are mostly ladies have taken career breaks, have worked in corporate for 5 to 10 years and have a good background in terms of their education and work profile, settled in Bangalore, Otana, Halwani (Aurangabad) and other areas across the country. The experts are a part of the Ixambee Team as the brand does not take a toss on quality with freelancers and consultants.

The Ixambee Family and Company Ethos:

The co-founders in the company are Chandraprakash who has experience in the banking background with 14 years in Yes Bank before the startup, Sandeep who belongs to the technical background and has also co-founded e-commerce platforms before Ixambee, and Arunima who has been working in her coaching institute since 2010, leads different divisions in the company with a total strength of 40 professionals.

With a relaxed company culture, each of the employees in the team is cooperative and works with a sense of ownership towards the brand. Each year, an offside is arranged the company where the family members of the team also join in, one of the examples of how the leaders are creating the company culture of Ixambee as a family.

Immediate Plans:

With 9 lakh registered students till date and more than 2000 paid students, the brand still has a lot of potential to grow which is what CEO Chandraprakash Joshi is planning as the immediate plans for the company in the online coaching space. He said sharing his views, "We have 9 lakh registered students on the website which is less as 3 crore people are preparing for these exams and hence we have a scope to grow and improve the quality rather than increasing the number of courses with our existing team."

"At the same time, we are looking forward to raising money. After the 'fundraise' we will go from these 50 mock tests to 200 mock tests and 8 learning courses to 50 learning courses and then we will focus on reaching more people and building revenue. We are working on both the plans with the existing team and set up along with plans after the funding." he further added.