“In the middle of the year we still had around 1,800 people, by the end of the year we will be at around 1,600 people,” announced Felix Ohswald, co-founder and CEO of GoStudent, on Thursday in an interview with the Viennese digital portal “Trending Topics”.
Not only Vienna is affected, but all global locations. In addition, the company will discontinue the business in the USA, which only started this year, and will manage the US business from Canada. In the future, the focus will be on the core markets of Germany, Austria and Switzerland (DACH), France, Great Britain, Italy and Spain.
GoStudent originally forecast growth of 250 percent for the coming year. “We have now reduced that to 80 percent,” says Ohswald. Access to capital has become more difficult. Bitpanda also announced staff cuts at the end of June due to poor business prospects. The number of employees there is to be reduced from more than 1,000 to 730.
Despite current problems on the market, Ohswald sees the learning platform as very resistant to crises. Demand continues to be very strong. “The topic of education is currently experiencing a tremendous boom (…) There is also a severe shortage of teachers, which is why many companies are trying to present innovative solutions here.” There is always a small percentage of customers who stop paying. “But we haven’t seen any significant increase here yet,” says Ohswald.
Always in the headlines
The tutoring start-up has recently been in the headlines again and again. Allegations of abuse against one of her tutors only became public in August. The teacher is said to have sexually harassed a student on the online tutoring platform. Ohswald: “When we heard about this case, we immediately did everything in our power and immediately broke away from the tutor in question. We also offered the parents and psychological support as well as support by presenting the facts to the public prosecutor’s office. Also we have started to incorporate new safeguarding principles.”
Before that, the focus was also on the working conditions at the company. Current and former tutors had raised serious allegations. “We always take every reproach from tutors seriously. We also have ongoing feedback rounds with tutors and families,” says Ohswald.
GoStudent was last valued at EUR 3 billion and is active in a total of 20 markets. In January, the learning platform received around 300 million euros from venture capitalists.
Source: Nachrichten
