Amidst the intense rivalry between Chinese online tutoring platforms, a Beijing-headquartered online education startup Zuoyebang has reportedly secured USD 1.6 billion in a new funding round which was led by Alibaba Group, a China-based multinational technology giant.
Other investors that participated in the funding round included FountainVest Partners, Sequoia Capital China, SoftBank Vision Fund, and Tiger Global Management. The recent development comes six months after Zuoyebang announced to have raised USD 750 million in a Series E funding round which was led by Tiger Global as well as FountainVest, cited sources with relevant information.
For those uninitiated, Zuoyebang specializes in offering online courses, homework, and live lessons for kindergarten to 12th-grade students.
According to the company, the total number of students using Zuoyebang’s live-stream classes accounted for 10 million in fall 2020. The company also claims to have over 170 million monthly active users, of which 50 million use its services regularly.
While a majority of this growth can be credited to the COVID-19 pandemic, Zuoyebang founder Hou Jianbin reportedly stated that the online education sector will continue to grow in the upcoming years. He added that the newly secured funds will allow the company to focus on K-12 classes and further expand its product portfolio.
The fresh investments have brought Zuoyebang’s valuation close to USD 2.93 billion. Although Zuoyebang did not disclose its current net worth, sources confirmed that the company intends to reach the USD billion mark.
Meanwhile, one of Zuoyebang’s rivals Yuanfudao had previously announced to have reached a USD 15.5 billion valuation after securing USD 2.2 billion in a funding round led by another Chinese multinational conglomerate Tencent Holdings Ltd. These newly secured funds reportedly pushed Yuanfudao replaced Indian online tutoring platform BYJU’s as the most valuable education technology company.
Source Credits –
https://financialpost.com/pmn/business-pmn/chinese-online-tutor-zuoyebang-raises-more-than-1-6-bln