A Gradual, Evolutionary Approach to Disrupting Education - with 17zuoye Cofounder Dun Xiao

The Shunwei China Venture Capital Podcast

Dun Xiao's pursuit of a quality education has taken him around the world, from Cambridge University to MIT and Harvard, where he studied electrical and information engineering. Armed with a lifelong passion for education and his technical background, Xiao Dun was inspired to found 17zuoye.com, (a.k.a. Homework Together), the largest online homework platform for K12 students in China. And so today, we explore Chinese Edtech - a market of particular significance in China given its traditional reverence for learning and the lucrative commercial opportunity this yields. With Dun, we explore key topics and trends, including: how do you segment the Edtech market in China (e.g. by learning groups, product and delivery type?) How do you look at future of education… does this involve building disruptive products that can be applied immediately (e.g. Alt School or Minerva in the US), or should it be more of an evolutionary process where technology is used to complement existing models? What drives key stakeholders in education ecosystem, and why is it relatively more difficult to scale a education business that involves working with teachers, students, parents, school systems, and the government? What is the role of data in education? How do you apply customized learning solutions onto the existing education system? And lastly, how do you get teachers to buy in on using new teaching solution and onboard them efficiently?