Robert Besser
15 Jan 2022, 03:06 GMT+10
BEIJING, China: In response to Beijing's sweeping overhaul of the private education industry, New Oriental Education, China's largest private education business, laid off 60,000 employees in 2021.
The company's billionaire founder, Yu Minhong, confirmed the shakeup in a post on his WeChat account over the weekend, adding that the company encountered "too many changes in 2021," and blamed the layoffs on "policies, the pandemic and international relations."
As Beijing is intensifying its efforts to curb what it considers unruly business practices, Yu's post highlights the difficulties facing private enterprises in China.
New York-listed Oriental was one of the most high-profile casualties of the widespread restrictions imposed on the country's $120 billion private tutoring sector.
In July, regulators imposed new rules that banned for-profit, after-school tutoring services and restricted such companies from making profits or raising capital, as they claimed too much tutoring overwhelmed children, placed excessive financial burdens on parents, and exacerbated social inequality.
Further, Chinese authorities ordered education businesses to suspend both online and offline tutoring classes.
After Yu's post drew attention, New Oriental said it did not "represent the views of the company." In a filing to the Hong Kong stock exchange, the company said it was reviewing its latest financial results and would eventually update the market.
The private tutoring ban shocked parents and left many businesses struggling, as well as triggered a sharp selloff of Chinese education companies in New York and Hong Kong.
It was also a sudden reversal of fortune for those companies, which attracted billions of dollars of funding from major investors, such as Tiger Global Management and SoftBank Group.
In addition, life will be difficult for the few surviving companies. Yu acknowledged in his post that New Oriental emerged from the last six months "with great difficulty."
In November, TAL Education, another Chinese tutoring giant, announced that it will shift its focus from teaching school curricula for kindergarten to ninth grades and instead tutor other subjects, such as music and sports, as well as expand operations abroad.
Get a daily dose of Venezuela Star news through our daily email, its complimentary and keeps you fully up to date with world and business news as well.
Publish news of your business, community or sports group, personnel appointments, major event and more by submitting a news release to Venezuela Star.
More InformationNEW YORK, New York - Bargain-hunters drove up the prices of stocks on U.S. markets on Tuesday."Our inputs today support ...
NEW DELHI, India: India has banned the exporting of wheat, despite stating it was targeting record international shipments this year, ...
NEW DELHI, India: Tesla made known this week that it will not sell electric automobiles in India due to the ...
SYDNEY, NSW, Australia - A potential easing of the Chinese government's crackdown on technology companies drove stocks in Hong Kong ...
KATHMANDU, Nepal - The governments of Nepal and India have signed a bilateral memorandum of understanding for the construction of ...
LOS ANGELES, California: Kia has become the second largest manufacturer of electric vehicles sold in the United States, second only ...
BEIJING, China: China's Foreign Ministry rebuked the U.S. for changing the wording about Taiwan on the State Department website, stressing ...
VATICAN CITY: While recovering from knee problems that have forced him to use a wheelchair last week, Pope Francis announced ...
SIALKOT, Pakistan - Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan has claimed that a plot to kill him was being hatched, ...
BERLIN, Germany: Citing Interior Ministry data, Welt am Sonntag newspaper has reported that more than 700,000 people fleeing the war ...
WASHINGTON D.C.: The U.S. airline industry is pressuring the Biden administration to lift a 16-month-old regulation requiring a negative COVID-19 ...
DOLNI MORAVA, Czech Republic: The world's longest pedestrian suspension bridge has opened at a mountain resort in the Czech Republic. ...