Chinese online art education business raises $40m
Chinese art education platform Yiqi Technology Group has raised $40 million in the first tranche of a Series C round led by Tencent Holdings. It is said to be the largest-ever funding round for a start-up in this space.
Additional contributions came from BlueRun Ventures, which led the company’s Series A round in 2014, as well as Hony Capital, Welight Capital, Long Hill Capital Management, and Chuangzhi Capital. The company has raised more than RMB500 million ($73 million) in the last four years.
Yiqi – which also goes by the name Meishubao or Art Treasure – was founded in 2014 by Ling Gan, a graduate from Beijing Fashion Institute who was previously a mobile internet product manager for TOM Online and Sina. Gan ran art schools in his spare time and eventually established 51meishu, an information source for students preparing for art college entrance examinations.
Yiqi has three business lines: a large-scale app-based learning community; a business that supplies educational materials and software to art training institutions; and an online platform specializing in one-to-one tuition. The first two channels are intended to drive business to the third, which is the primary means of monetization. The one-to-one platform serves more than 40,000 students in 30 countries, with monthly revenue of RMB40 million.
Shunwei Capital joined BlueRun in Yiqi’s $4.6 million Series A round in 2014. Over the next two years, the company completed two rounds of renminbi-denominated fundraising worth a combined RMB114 million. Last October it received $15 million from Long Hill, Welight, BlueRun and Changzhi. This was described as the third tranche of the Series B round.
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