China’s Leading Online After School Education Start-up Zuoyebang Raises Over US$1.6 Billion in Series E+ Financing

BEIJING – Zuoyebang, China’s leading online after school education start-up, has raised over US$1.6 Billion in its Series E+ financing from investors including Alibaba, Tiger Global, Softbank Vision Fund, Sequoia Capital China, Fountainvest Partners and Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan Board (Ontario Teachers’). Taihecap was Zuoyebang’s financial advisor for this round of fundraising.

With the new capital, Zuoyebang will continue to focus on developing its core business of live streaming courses, enhancing its strength in after school education technology and market penetration capabilities, and investing to strengthen and expand its existing product portfolios.

Hou Jianbin, founder and CEO of Zuoyebang, said, “Making quality education accessible to all has been Zuoyebang’s mission since our inception. It drives our growth and continuous efforts to maintain our leading position in innovation, penetration and scale. The online after school education sector in China is moving into a new phase of development which urges leading players to define the market with high-quality, innovative and sustainable growth. The new capital will enable Zuoyebang to accelerate our growth, going from strength to strength, and to provide better education resources to meet the huge demand in the Chinese market.”

Earlier in June 2020, Zuoyebang completed US$750 million in Series E funding, joined by leading international venture investors including Fountainvest Partners, Tiger Global, Sequoia Capital China, SoftBank’s Vision Fund, Primavera Capital, GGV Capital, Xiang He Capital, Tiantu Capital, and Taihecap.

Since it was established in 2015, Zuoyebang has grown into a leader in China’s online after school education sector. Driven by its innovative technology and the largest online question database globally in the sector – with over 300 million questions – the company provides all-round digital solutions via its popular after school education apps that complement the existing public education curriculum. These include Zuoyebang Super App, Zuoyebang Live Courses App, Zuoyebang Oral Arithmetic Calculation App, and YAYA AI Courses App. Notably, by integrating AI-enabled functions to give users one-stop access to the whole suite of Zuoyebang products and services, the flagship Zuoyebang Super App remains in top place in the education category of the China Apple App Store, with more than 100 million monthly active users. Zuoyebang’s Paperang Printer, a smart hardware device providing leading error-management solutions which has gained over 7.5 million registered users, also continues to lead market share in its category in China.

Zuoyebang has the largest user base in China’s online after school education market with more than 50 million daily active users, 170 million monthly active users, and 800 million user-registered devices in total. In the 2020 fall semester, the number of enrolled users for Zuoyebang’s live streaming courses reached a record high of 10 million across the industry, while the number of regular full length classes’ users has also increased, representing a growth of more than 24 times in the past three years – 70% of them from more remote third or lower tier cities.

Zuoyebang’s sustainable growth comes from its user scale advantage, strong geographical penetration, outstanding operational efficiency, and systematic quality control. In addition, its overall customer acquisition cost is lowest among peers and less than half of the industry average.

Zuoyebang employs over 35,000 staff in China. Headquartered in Beijing, the company has expanded its footprint and now has 11 branches across the country including in Xi'an, Hefei, Zhengzhou, Wuhan, Chengdu, Chongqing, Jinan, Changsha, Nanjing, and Shijiazhuang.

About Zuoyebang
Founded in 2015, Zuoyebang is the largest online after school education start-up in China, offering a comprehensive suite of online tutoring products and services for students covering all academic subjects. With the mission of “making quality education accessible to all,” the company is a technology-driven online after school education services provider that addresses the unmet needs in China’s after school education market by increasing the coverage and penetration of quality online after school tutoring across the country.

About Ontario Teachers'
The Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan Board (Ontario Teachers') is the administrator of Canada's largest single-profession pension plan, with C$204.7 billion in net assets (all figures at June 30, 2020 unless noted). It holds a diverse global portfolio of assets, approximately 80% of which is managed in-house, and has earned an annual total-fund net return of 9.5% since the plan's founding in 1990. Ontario Teachers' is an independent organization headquartered in Toronto. Its Asia-Pacific regional offices are in Hong Kong and Singapore, and its Europe, Middle East & Africa region office is in London. The defined-benefit plan, which is fully funded as of January 1, 2020, invests and administers the pensions of the province of Ontario's 329,000 active and retired teachers. For more information, visit otpp.com and follow us on Twitter @OtppInfo.

For media enquiries, please contact:

Zuoyebang
Haizhen Gu
guhaizhen@zuoyebang.com
+86 155 012 979 12

Ontario Teachers'
Hugh Christopher
media@otpp.com
+1 416-844-7463