Ronnie Screwvala-backed Lido Learning in soup as ex-employees mull legal action

Edtech start-up Lido Learning, which is backed by serial entrepreneur Ronnie Screwvala’s Unilazer Ventures, Shaadi.com's Anupam Mittal, Paytm CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma, among other prominent investors, has run into trouble over funding issues, multiple sources told Business Today. Lido Learning, which raised $10 million in a Series C funding round in September last year from Unilazer Ventures, is likely to be served a legal notice by the firm's current/ ex-employees over non-payment of salaries over the past few months.

Sources have said that the management has cited the lack of funding and resources as one of  the reasons for non-payment of dues and have informed the employees wishing to quit the company that the payments will be done once the educational tablets are recovered. However the same hasn’t been done.

Besides the employees, the parents of the students who enrolled in various programmes at the edtech firm also told BT that the classes haven’t been conducted regularly and various calls to the customer care team/management remained unanswered.  Sources said that the company hasn’t  yet decided on winding up its operations, as against  some reports of the firm having shut down.

Business Today has reached out to Lido Learning for a comment.  The story will be updated as and when their response is received.

Nitish Banka, Advocate, Supreme Court of India, who has spoken to many agreeived ex-employees and parents of the chldren enrolled at Lido learning, told BT that two mails were sent by the company management to the employees over the issue of non-payment of salaries.

“One of the mails cited the reason of lack of funding behind the non-payment of salaries and the other one has urged the employees to wait for 90 days and the saalries will be credited. It is natural that the employees will take a legal route,” Banka said.

Jatin Saluja, one of the ex-employees at Lido Learning, said in a Linkedln post that he had sold a subscription to a client while he was working at the edtech start-up, which was later cancelled within 15 days.

“It has been almost six months and I'm not sure if I can be patient as I'm not getting any response. I'm filing a Consumer Service Complaint against the founder and the investors who's identity they used to lure employees and customers,” Saluja added.

Bhupendra Dixit, an aggrieved parent who had paid Rs 33,000 to the company for maths tuition of his son ( 8th standard), said that the classes have not been conducted for sometime and that he has tried to connect with the management several times, which remained unanswered.

“They have not told us anything about the company shutting down. I had to take loans for paying the tuition fees. This is tantamount to cheating,” Dixit said.