Indian Franchise Report 2012

The Indian Education Report 2012' is a pioneering effort on part of Franchise India Holdings Limited to bring to the forefront the paradigm shift in the education ecosystem. The business of education is evolving, supported by a strong consumption force, edging the education service providers to take their businesses to the next level of enterprise development. The education report has worked around to bring forward a comprehensive study analysing the consumption and education business in light of growing global competition.

The $80 billion Indian education industry, growing continuously at 13 per cent, is largely fragmented into segments based on learning and further divided into organised and unorganised segments. One of the fastest growing segments is the pre-school space, with growing consumer awareness about early learning initiatives for a child's development and also lowering of the age of an average pre-schooler from 3 years to 2 years. This segment is valued at $1 billion, over running the entire industry's growth rate by amplifying at 38 per cent.

Further, the K-12 industry is witnessing a changeover from being exam oriented to again focusing on developmental learning, with digital learning, sports and creative learning tools being a regular aspect of the curriculum. The not-for-profit agenda no longer stands as a mandate for education enterprises. With corporate foraying into education joint ventures, franchising, public-private partnerships and private equity are making inclusions into the education business space.

Given the fast age created by television programmes and CDIT gadgets, a child's exposure to the digital world is much more than what it was a decade ago. Taking a note of this, even the education industry needs to evolve and incorporate ICT to keep up with the learner's pace. Thus, ICT in education has come up as a new faced segment in the education industry as an independent segment.

Also, vocational education as 'further education' is growing amongst the Indian workforce for more practical, hands-on training. Though the vocational education initiatives in India are not as developed as their international counterparts, it is a $3.8 billion market growing at 25 per cent.

The next segment growing leaps and bounds and foraying from unorganised to the organised segment is the coaching industry. With many players setting quality benchmarks for formal institutes and expanding to set foot in the formal education system, the $8 billion industry is growing at 19 per cent.

India has only 12 per cent gross enrollment percentage for higher education; around 450,000 Indian students spend over $13 billion each year in acquiring higher education overseas. Only 20 per cent of the technical graduates in India are employable. There is a strong need for the higher education curriculum to promote entrepreneurship and formalise 'Further Education' initiatives.

Overall, the report aims to incorporate trends in the industry, as well as bring forward a study of the overall consumption, as these are the factors that govern the growth and evolution of education building up as an enterprise.