India holds an important place in the global education industry. The country has more than 1.4 million schools with over 227 million students enrolled and more than 36, 000 higher education institutes. India has one of the largest higher education systems in the world. However, there is still a lot of potential for further development in the education system.

India has become the second largest market for e-learning after the US. The sector is currently pegged at US$ 2-3 billion, and is expected to touch US$ 40 billion by 2017. The distance education market in India is expected to grow at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of around 34 per cent# during 2013-14 to 2017-18. Moreover, the aim of the government to raise its current gross enrolment ratio to 30 per cent by 2020 will also boost the growth of the distance education in India.

Market Size

The education sector in India is poised to witness major growth in the years to come as India will have world’s largest tertiary-age population and second largest graduate talent pipeline globally by the end of 2020. In FY 2015-16, the education market was worth about US$ 100 billion and is expected to reach US$ 116.4 billion in FY 2016-17. Currently, higher education contributes 59.7 per cent of the market size, school education 38.1 per cent, pre-school segment 1.6 per cent, and technology and multi-media the remaining 0.6 per cent.

Higher education system in India has undergone rapid expansion. Currently, India’s higher education system is the largest in the world enrolling over 70 million students while in less than two decades, India has managed to create additional capacity for over 40 million students. At present, higher education sector witnesses spending of over Rs 46, 200 crore (US$ 6.78 billion), and it is expected to grow at an average annual rate of over 18 per cent to reach Rs 232, 500 crore (US$ 34.12 billion) in next 10 years.

India’s IT firms are working with academic institutions and setting up in-house institutes to groom the right talent as these companies move to Social Media, Mobility, Analytics and Cloud (SMAC) technologies.

Investment

The total amount of Foreign Direct Investments (FDI) inflow into the education sector in India stood at US$ 1, 256 million from April 2000 to March 2016, according to data released by Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP).

Source: www.ibef.org