Success Story Of Alakh Pandey: How A Tution Teacher Launched India’s 101st Unicorn

In this modern era, new technological advancements coupled with affordable equipment has revamped the entire education system in India. Many Edtech startups have emerged in the past few years to make learning simple and interesting for students. Physics Wallah is one of those startups that flourished during the pandemic and devised a new scheme of e-learning by making it fun. The passion for teaching has pushed the founder of Physics Wallah – Alakh Pandey to start his own YouTube channel that has today become the 101st Unicorn of India. 

In this blog, we will tell you about the success story of Alakh Pandey and discuss how his e-learning platform joined the Unicorn club. 

His Early Days

Alakh Pandey was born in 1991 in Uttar Pradesh. Right from his childhood days, Alakh had a keen interest in studies and he was a bright student. Pandey came from a humble family background so in order to support his parents financially, he started teaching students when he was just in 8th standard. Alakh later wanted to go to IIT but unfortunately, failed to crack the entrance exam. So, he took admission in an engineering college in Kanpur. However, to fulfill their son’s dreams Pandey’s family had to sell their house to pay Alakh’s engineering fees. 

In college, Alakh used to take part in several dramas and eventually, he developed a likeness for acting. But owing to his interest in teaching, Pandey chose to drop out of engineering and went back to his hometown. There, he started teaching students in a coaching institute for just Rs 5,000 per month. However, Alakh always knew that he could not teach many students in a small coaching institute. So in 2016, he started his YouTube channel –  Physics Wallah.

Launch Of Physics Wallah

After launching his YouTube channel, Alakh Pandey began streaming lectures on “physics” covering a wide range of topics. However, he did not achieve much success. So, he decided to improve the quality of his content. For this, he bought study materials from Kota and Rajasthan to prepare and make his own lectures. Finally, all his hard work paid off and his channel’s viewership increased significantly. Alakh’s innovative and unique teaching approach made him immensely popular among young students and his YouTube channel gained millions of subscribers in a short span of time. 

Reaching The Pinnacle Of Success

Despite many ups and downs, Physics Wallah has had an inspiring journey so far. A YouTube Channel, which had a slow start, reached 2 million subscribers by the end of 2019. And when the country entered COVID-19 lockdowns, the demand for Physics Wallah grew higher. As a result, Alakh Pandey decided to expand his platform and launched the Physics Wallah app for online lectures. The startup now provides both offline and online classes for students by the name PW Pathshala. 

Today, more than 60 lakh students use Physics Wallah for their learning and exam preparations. This Edtech startup even joined the much-coved Unicorn club in June 2022. Alakh is planning to open more offline centres to provide the best coaching for the students.