What kind of sparks can be generated when an educational technology company collaborates with an educational auxiliary development company? Recently, Xueersi and Wanwei Original Culture Communication (Shaanxi) Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Wanwei") have reached a cooperation agreement. The two parties will cooperate on new curriculum standard teaching and research content, learning data, and traffic, among other areas.

Wanwei is one of the leading players in the field of educational aids. According to its disclosed data, the sales of Wanwei books exceeded 50 million copies by October 2024. Wanwei's founder, Wu Zetao, told Duozhi that they had interactions and exchanges with Xueersi back in 2020. He mentioned, "Xueersi is strong in the content for primary school segments, while Wanwei excels in the middle school segment. Our cooperation complements each other and leverages each other's strengths."

Li Xingwu, the product head of Xueersi learning devices, stated, "Our cooperation with Wanwei will be implemented in various businesses, such as learning devices, where a core component is practice. Practice requires a large number of good questions. Although Xueersi excels in content, good content is dynamic and diverse and cannot be monopolized by one company. Hence, besides our excellent content, we seek to collaborate with the top content providers in the industry, and Wanwei is an outstanding example."

It is evident that Xueersi is improving its digital content ecosystem. In the future, this diverse content will be reflected in products such as learning devices. For Xueersi, a substantial question bank aids faster evolution in intelligent problem-solving. For Wanwei, the collaboration will help provide timely feedback data, enhancing the user experience, and further improving Wanwei's content creation.

"Persisting in difficult but correct tasks, Wanwei develops 200,000 original exam questions annually."

Since its establishment in 2003, Wanwei has been quietly developing in Xi'an, accumulating over 20 years of experience in the field of educational auxiliary books, particularly excelling in the high school entrance examination field. Wu Zetao revealed that Wanwei's advantages lie in the regionality and originality of its high school entrance exam content, which complements Xueersi’s strengths, and their cooperation is expected to yield great results.

High school exam auxiliary preparation has significant barriers due to regional exam question setting. Wu Zetao explained, "We chose a difficult but correct path. Our experience is that the more we do difficult things, the easier they become, while the easier things become more challenging over time."

Wu Zetao elaborated to Duozhi, "Many high school entrance exams are set at the provincial level, such as in Henan, Shaanxi, Anhui, and Yunnan, while others are set at the municipal level, like in Jiangsu and Sichuan. Therefore, high school entrance exam auxiliary materials are not unified nationwide but rather tailored to specific regions. Although we can't cover every city, we try our best, using other services to compensate where our products do not reach."

Despite the challenges, Wanwei has persisted and secured an important position in the national high school entrance exam auxiliary market. Over recent years, Wanwei has expanded into new areas, such as the high school auxiliary brand Tengyuan launched in 2008 and the primary school auxiliary brand Xiaobai’ou launched in 2023. "Our basic market and stronghold remain the high school entrance exam," said Wu Zetao.

"We persist in difficult but correct tasks, constantly taking on tough challenges that offer our team valuable opportunities for growth, thus enhancing our team’s combat effectiveness," Wu Zetao emphasized.

Currently, a new trend in high school entrance exams is provincial-level unified question setting. Provinces such as Zhejiang, Hubei, and Hunan have already implemented this. Wu Zetao indicated that this is beneficial for Wanwei as their research becomes more focused.

Wanwei highly values content originality, maintaining a research institute with over a thousand members. Interestingly, Wanwei’s emphasis on original questions stems from a deep exchange with Xueersi. Wu Zetao reminisced about their first deep exchange with Xueersi’s founder Zhang Bangxin on August 6, 2020. This meeting left a strong impression due to Zhang’s pragmatic approach and acute crisis awareness.

In one of their initial discussions, Zhang asked about the originality of questions, prompting Wanwei to emphasize unique question development. Since then, Wanwei has focused on developing high-quality original questions, producing over 200,000 a year, ensuring that every Wanwei book provides a unique user experience.

"Xueersi is a highly respected enterprise, and it is an honor to collaborate and grow together," Wu Zetao noted, expressing further appreciation after their visit.

"This collaboration primarily focuses on content."

The cooperation between Xueersi and Wanwei centers around four areas:

1. Teaching and Research: With the new curriculum standards, both the teaching method and learning process are massive challenges. Xueersi excels in primary education content, while Wanwei leads in secondary education, with a research institute of over a thousand members.

2. Data: With millions of users, the collaboration can leverage user learning data to uncover valuable insights for enhancing children's education.

3. Traffic: How to share and manage user traffic will be explored in future cooperation.

4. Long-term Opportunities: This includes exploring joint operations and more complex cooperative opportunities over the long term.

Li Xingwu emphasized that teaching and research is the most critical part of this collaboration. Changes in curriculum standards will impact teaching objectives, concepts, and methods, driving significant changes in content. To address the new curriculum standards, Xueersi learning devices have updated 40% of the content, but further improvements are needed.

Regarding product implementation, Li disclosed that the learning device is one of the methods for collaboration. Given that practice is core to these products, there is a need to source substantial high-quality content from various providers.

In terms of intelligent learning hardware, Wu indicated that Wanwei would opt for partnerships rather than independent R&D, utilizing partners' advanced products like Xueersi learning devices.

Embedding Wanwei's content into Xueersi’s hardware can enhance user experience through timely data feedback, enabling immediate learning analysis and targeted practice.

AI-guided practice enhancement requires substantial content accumulation to build extensive question banks, and this is a key reason for Xueersi seeking content partnerships.

Focused on advancing AI capabilities in the practice scenario, the collaboration emphasizes high-quality content collection, precise question generation, and AI-aided learning analysis, encompassing all aspects of the practice process for an improved user experience.

Ultimately, with collaborative content resources like those from Wanwei, Xueersi's learning devices can offer comprehensive AI-based practice support and enhance overall educational outcomes for students.

Source: Duozhi

Author: Wang Shang

Original Link: https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/bBg_EAKzCc-xf8ciSaeJvA