Chinese online education platform TutorGroup raises $200m
TutorGroup, a Chinese online education platform, has raised $200 million in a Series C round of funding from new investors including GIC Private and the Russia-China Investment Fund (RCIF).
Goldman Sachs and Silverlink Capital also participated, followed by existing backers including Alibaba Group, Temasek Holdings, Qiming Venture Partners, SBI Holdings and CyberAgent Ventures. The round values TutorGroup at more than $1 billion.
TutorGroup was set up in Taiwan in 2004 by brothers Eric Yang and Ming Yang and initially provided classroom-based English tutorials, competing with the likes of Wall Street English and EF Education First. The company subsequently launched an online platform with a view to entering the mainland market.
J.P. Gan, managing partner at Qiming, told AVCJ that he first came across TutorGroup from classified ads in Chinese newspapers and then made a cold call to the founders. Qiming first invested in the company in April 2012, committing $15 million. CyberAgent Ventures invested a few months later.
The Series B round, which closed at $100 million in 2014, saw Alibaba, Temasek and SBI Group participate alongside Qiming. Alibaba is said to have covered about half of the entire round, while SBI's capital commitment came from the SBI-Fudan Fund, an education-focused vehicle set up with an investment unit of Shanghai's Fudan University.
TutorGroup offers tuition services to adults through its TutorABC and VIPABC platforms in the Greater China region, as well as a separate service for school-age students. Supported by an R&D team in Silicon Valley, it provides real-time language learning through online class sessions in 60 countries with more than 4,500 tutors to date.
The company expects the adult English language-learning market to grow at 25% per year through 2016, by which point it will be worth more than $21 billion. It has also expanded beyond English tuition, having launched TutorMing, which targets foreign students learning Mandarin Chinese.
With the new funding, TutorGroup is looking to expand further into other subjects. It sees opportunities to connect users and experts, from professional consulting services such as legal counsel, medical advice and personal wealth management to leisure learning such as cooking and yoga.
"As a long-term investor, we believe there are growth opportunities in the online learning sector. TutorGroup is the pioneer with a strong track record in customizing online learning and collaboration experience," Ravi Balasubramanian, head of Asia equities research at GIC, said in a statement.
RCIF was created in 2012 with capital commitments from Russian Direct Investment Fund and China Investment Corporation (CIC). It focuses on cross-border transactions.
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