About the Client
An international education group with an established presence in student recruitment and pathway education, working with universities across several countries.
The group wanted its own campus in India rather than continuing to operate only through partner institutions. GIFT City, Gujarat's international financial services centre, had recently opened to foreign universities under a dedicated regulatory framework, and two international universities had already been approved to set up there. The group saw an opportunity to join an emerging education cluster early.
We were appointed in mid 2023 to take the project from concept to application.
Objective
Establish an International Branch Campus or Offshore Education Centre at GIFT City. The scope ran from the conceptual plan and the course portfolio through to entity registration, the financial and administrative model, engagement with the authority and submission of the application itself.
The brief, in short, was to get the campus approved. It was not, at the outset, to ask whether that campus was the right first move.
Challenges
Three things emerged once the work was under way.
The education cluster was still forming. The two universities approved ahead of our client were themselves at an early stage, still building towards their first cohorts. That is entirely normal for a new cluster. It also meant there was no local admissions record yet against which anyone could test the numbers a third campus would depend on.
The business case rested entirely on admissions. Approvals can be obtained. Buildings can be built and faculty can be recruited. Whether enough students enrol, at the fee the model assumes, is the one variable that decides if a campus of this kind works, and it was the variable we could not yet put a defensible figure against.
The regulatory picture changed mid mandate. Towards the end of 2023 the University Grants Commission notified its own regulations for foreign higher educational institutions setting up campuses in India. A second route had opened, and it was a different shape from the first.
Solutions
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We worked on registration and viability at the same time
We took the group through the entity registration the framework requires, and built the conceptual plan, the course portfolio suited to the financial centre and the administrative structure alongside it.
Running in parallel was the financial and funding model, and that is where the engagement turned. Building the model meant putting real numbers against enrolment, fee levels and the cost of operating a campus inside the zone. The registration work could be completed. The enrolment assumption could not be evidenced, and no funding model is stronger than the demand assumption sitting underneath it.
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We put the two routes side by side
Rather than treat the new framework as a competitor to the work already done, we assessed both properly.
- The financial centre route carried genuine tax advantages, available for a defined period, with the campus located inside the zone.
- The Commission's route carried no equivalent tax treatment, but allowed an institution to acquire its own land and build its own campus anywhere in India, with approval granted once rather than on a renewable term.
For a group whose binding constraint was student demand rather than tax exposure, the second difference weighed more heavily than the first.
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We moved the question to where the students are
The useful question was no longer whether a campus could be approved, but where enough students would come from to fill one. Established student movement patterns pointed consistently to a small set of metropolitan markets. We assessed Delhi, Bengaluru, Mumbai and Chennai against the group's likely programme mix and fee position, and travelled to Delhi to inspect properties and understand what an owned campus would realistically cost and look like there.
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We advised the group to hold, and to widen the search
Our recommendation was to complete the registrations, hold the campus application at that stage, and open the search to other locations. The reasoning was about sequence rather than destination. The case for any single site would be far easier to build once the first cohorts had produced real admissions evidence, and a newly opened national route deserved proper assessment before capital went into any one location.
Result
The group completed its entity registration for the financial services centre in line with the applicable norms, and did not take the campus application further at that stage. In light of the new Commission regulations it widened its India assessment to include the metropolitan markets we had mapped.
The engagement changed shape as a result. What was commissioned as an application mandate became a strategic assessment, and what we handed over was a decision rather than an approval.
A campus that opens ahead of the demand it needs is a far more expensive mistake than the time spent confirming that demand exists.
Both routes into India are now considerably clearer than they were in 2023, and the group is weighing its options against evidence that simply did not exist when the work began. GIFT City continues to develop as an education destination, and remains a credible option for institutions whose model suits it.
Client details are withheld at the client's discretion. Figures describe the scope and conduct of the engagement.