BITS alumni-led CodeTantra powers AI-based coding education

Hyderabad: City-based edtech company CodeTantra, founded in 2014 by BITS alumni and long-time collaborators, has grown from a small startup into a technology platform serving over 10 lakh students across more than 200 institutions in India, with a strong focus on bridging the skill gap between academia and industry.

CodeTantra was founded by Ravi Shekhar and Ramana TSV, who studied together at BITS and graduated in 2000. After working together in several IT companies, the duo identified a persistent problem in the education ecosystem — a gap between the skills taught in universities and those required by industry. “Industry has always complained that graduates lack the practical skills needed for jobs. Instead of just blaming the system, we wanted to build a solution that could bridge this gap,” said Ramana, co-founder and CEO.

CodeTantra began with a unique concept — an interactive platform designed to teach coding through hands-on practice rather than traditional classroom methods. At a time when programming was largely taught theoretically on blackboards with limited lab practice, the founders introduced a platform where teachers and students could work simultaneously in a digital lab environment. “Programming is like swimming or music. It cannot be learned through theory alone. Students need constant practice and immediate feedback, and that is what our platform enables,” Ramana explained.

However, the journey was far from easy in the early years. From 2014 to 2017, the startup struggled to find its first client despite demonstrating the product to nearly 400 institutions across the country.

“I personally drove more than one lakh kilometres across India during those three years. Many institutions appreciated the idea but hesitated to adopt it until someone else tried it first,” he recalled. The breakthrough came when Raghu Engineering College in Vizianagaram became the first institution to implement the platform, helping the company establish credibility in the education sector.

Initially operating with just two employees, the company grew slowly and had about 20–25 employees before the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic, however, proved to be a turning point. As educational institutions struggled to continue classes online, CodeTantra developed a video teaching platform that could function even on extremely low internet bandwidth.

Today, CodeTantra offers more than six products for the higher education sector. Its platforms are used by IIT Madras, IIT Bombay, IIT Kanpur and IIT Guwahati, as well as major universities such as VIT, SRM, GITAM, Lovely Professional University, Chandigarh University and KIIT in Bhubaneswar. The company currently records more than five lakh daily active learners on its platforms. Its AI framework leverages advanced vision and language models from global tech providers such as Google and OpenAI, combined with the company’s proprietary AI agents and logic systems.

With no revenue during the first three years, the founders invested around Rs10–15 crore over time, largely through family funding and bank loans. CodeTantra began generating steady revenues after the pandemic and has been profitable for the past three years. The company reported revenue of Rs26 crore in 2025 and expects it to grow to nearly Rs40 crore this year. From a modest beginning with just a handful of employees, CodeTantra has now grown to a workforce of over 300 employees, with plans to double that number in the next two years.

“Because we are building more AI-powered products and integrating AI deeply into our platforms, we are hiring more people. In the next two years, our employee strength could increase from 300 to around 600,” the founder said.

Looking ahead, CodeTantra aims to expand beyond higher education institutions by collaborating with governments to improve digital learning and assessment systems in government schools. “Our goal is not just business growth but impact. We want our technology to reach crores of students across India,” Ramana said.