The company is a sub-brand of Chinese online education firm VIPKid. It operates as an online education brand. The sub-brand raised $80 million in a Series A round of financing. The round was led by Sequoia Capital China and Tencent. The article did not provide details on the sub-brand's product specifics, user metrics, revenue, valuation, or future plans. VIPKid is a global education technology company that connects children with the world’s best teachers in real-time online classes; its platform links paying students with teachers in the US and Canada. Founded in 2013 and formally launched in 2014, the company has become China’s market-leading online education startup. In 2019 VIPKid reported strong growth, attracting over 700,000 paying students and over 90,000 teachers. With its Series E financing led by Tencent, VIPKid plans to increase investment in high-quality content development, talent and technology while enhancing operational efficiency. The company emphasizes personalized learning and a global classroom approach to boost competitiveness and expand market reach. Historical backers include Tencent, Coatue Management, Sequoia Capital, Sinovation Ventures, Yunfeng Capital, Matrix Partners, Learn Capital, Northern Light VC and Bryant Stibel. VIPKID is an online language school that connects English teachers with students via live one-on-one tutorials. The company is based in Beijing and was founded in 2013. Its core product combines online education, live video streaming and e-commerce to deliver English lessons and related curriculum. VIPKID has grown to over 40,000 teachers and 300,000 students across 35 markets. The company plans to use new funding to add more curriculum and products (including online textbooks), improve engineering and product experience, provide additional teacher tools and support, and explore machine-learning applications to advance learning. VIPKID delivers one-to-one online English immersion lessons connecting children in China with teachers in the U.S. and Canada. Founded in October 2013 and based in Beijing, it serves over 200,000 paying students and more than 20,000 teachers as of August 2017. The company reported monthly revenue of RMB 400 million (US$60M) in July 2017, projecting annual revenue of RMB 5 billion (US$750M). Its core product uses a progressive pedagogy aligned to U.S. Common Core standards and the company has launched Lingo Bus, a fully immersive online Mandarin program for children. VIPKID plans to use new capital to enhance teaching quality, develop contextualized textbooks and improve online classroom UX, scale Lingo Bus, and expand philanthropic initiatives including rural China schools. The company has attracted investors including Sinovation Ventures, Sequoia Capital, Yunfeng Capital, Matrix Partners, Learn Capital, Northern Light VC and Bryant Stibel. VIPKID operates an online one-to-one English-learning platform targeting Chinese children aged 5–12, pairing them with native-speaking instructors based mainly in the U.S. and several other countries. The company built its own videoconferencing platform and a curriculum aligned to U.S. Common Core standards that uses a flipped-classroom approach and gamification; it is beginning to introduce mobile apps but has primarily focused on desktop/broadband delivery. VIPKID charges 288 yuan (about $43) per 30-minute session and pays teachers between $7 and $11 per half-hour, while offering a single free trial lesson. The business reports 10x year-over-year growth, about 500,000 registered students, roughly 3,000 instructors, and is adding roughly 1,000 new instructors per month. It faces significant competition from local and global language-learning offerings but is using its human-taught, one-to-one model and proprietary tech to differentiate and plans to expand users, subjects, and instructors with new funding.

Total raised

$880M

Funding rounds

5

Latest round

Series A

Latest activity

Jan 2020