It has also appointed a China Head and has signed 10 new strategic partnerships with Asia-based education consultancies
A mere two months after Cialfo raised a pre-Series A round, the Singapore-based edtech college admissions startup has announced the launch of a new chapter in Shanghai, China – the first office outside of Singapore.
To facilitate its Chinese operations, Cialfo has appointed Jack Cui to be Director of China. Cui was formerly the China Operations Director for Gabbitas Education, a leading UK-based educational consulting firm.
He will also bring to the table extensive local relationships with education consulting firms and agencies in China to further Cialfo’s reach into the market.
And on that point, Cialfo has also minted ten new strategic partnership agreements in the country. These include Shanghai Dingshi Education and Randian Consultant. Shanghai Dingshi Consultant is an education consultancy which links China-based students with UK and US universities, while Randian is an investment and operations company in the education sector with operations in Beijing, Tianjing, and Heibei.
Both companies aim to leverage on Cialfo’s SaaS platform to boost acceptance rates for its students.
“Cialfo’s white label solution really takes care of the college admissions process end-to-end. Our students love the features, such as how simple it is to track their admissions status and priority tasks, all in one easy-to-use platform,” said Yanqun Shao, CEO of Shanghai Dingshi Education, in an official press statement.
“It’s really what’s missing from the education ecosystem, and we can see adoption among consultancies in and around Shanghai – and further afield – really ramping up in 2017.”
In a previous interview with e27, Cialfo’s co-founder Rohan Pasari said that he was exploring integrating the platform with messaging platform WeChat in China.
Beyond that, Cialfo is looking to collaborate with more education service providers and after-school enrichment programmes and connect them with existing consultancies on the platform.
Founded in 2012 by Pasari and Stanley Chia, Cialfo’s aim is to make college admissions simple. It targets the annual US$4 billion market of Asia-based students entering US and UK universities.
“Cialfo’s vision is to help a million students find their dream college through our platform by 2020. Key to this is to partner with the right education consultancies to tap into edtech opportunities in Asia, particularly in China and India where opportunities are most apparent,” said Pasari, in an press statement.
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Image Credit: Cialfo
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