Melbourne-based education technology company Maxme says it has established a nationwide presence in India in less than two years, marking a major step in the international expansion of an Australian platform focused on developing human skills for students and early-career workers.
Founded in Melbourne in 2019 by chief executive Renata Sguario, Maxme delivers digital training programs aimed at strengthening non-technical skills such as communication, resilience, creative thinking and adaptability. The company says its platform is designed for late secondary school students, university learners and junior employees preparing for workplaces increasingly shaped by artificial intelligence and automation.
India has become Maxme’s first international market, with the company’s growth there supported by Austrade-led delegations, in-market visits and government-backed education promotion events. Sguario said India had long been central to the company’s expansion plans and described the local Austrade team as instrumental in helping Maxme gain traction.
“We’ve built a nationwide business in India in just under two years,” she said, adding that the support received on the ground had given the business confidence to scale.
Rather than pursuing a joint venture model, Maxme chose to establish its own limited liability company in Noida, Uttar Pradesh, after identifying the state as offering the right conditions and incentives for growth. The company now has five full-time employees in India and a network of 25 facilitators, with plans for further expansion as partnerships deepen.
Maxme’s strategy in India has been built around complementing, rather than competing with, existing education and training providers. While many partners focus on technical upskilling, Sguario said Maxme adds the “human upskilling element”, allowing it to fit naturally into a broader skills ecosystem.
That approach has helped the company build 16 major partnerships across India, with programs now running in Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai and Delhi. The business says it is targeting final-year school students, university graduates, teachers and workers in the first few years of their careers.
Maxme has also used Australian government-backed education events to grow its profile in the Indian market. The company participated in education-focused delegations including an EdTech mission and the DIDAC mission in 2025, and also joined the Festival of Australia, a program designed to showcase Australian education offerings across India.
According to the company, these events provided valuable exposure in major cities, generated commercial leads and helped convert relationships into formal agreements. Maxme says it has signed multiple memoranda of understanding with educational institutions, with some already moving into implementation.
Among the examples cited by the company are recent program delivery with Kings Cornerstone International College in Chennai and the launch of programs with Ramaiah Academy in Bengaluru. These projects are being presented as evidence that Maxme’s India operations are now moving beyond market exploration and into active delivery.
The company’s growth in India comes at a time when Australia is seeking deeper engagement with India across education, skills and technology. In that context, Maxme’s expansion is being framed not only as a commercial success for an Australian startup, but also as part of a broader push to turn Australian knowledge-based services into export growth in one of the world’s largest and fastest-growing skills markets.
For Maxme, the next challenge is scale. Sguario has set a target of reaching four million unique users in India by 2030, an ambitious goal in a highly competitive education market. But the company is betting that demand for affordable human skills development will continue to rise as India prepares students and young workers for an economy where technical knowledge alone may no longer be enough.
Support our Journalism
No-nonsense journalism. No paywalls. Whether you’re in Australia, the UK, Canada, the USA, or India, you can support The Australia Today by taking a paid subscription via Patreon or donating via PayPal — and help keep honest, fearless journalism alive.
