Education technology conference opens in Beijing

The 2016 Global Education Technology Conference got underway in Beijing on Friday.

Hundreds of business leaders in the sector from China and abroad gathered for the three-day event, including representatives from New Oriental Education & Technology Group; iFlytek Co Ltd, a Chinese enterprise dedicated to intelligent speech and language technologies; and Youdao, a popular online dictionary and translation brand from leading Chinese IT company NetEase Inc.

The main themes that will be discussed are exploring new opportunities, improving education quality and connecting technology and the internet.

Sun Chang, CEO of koolearn, an online education brand of New Oriental Education & Technology Group, said New Oriental was eyeing opportunities in elite international schools and private kindergartens as it looks toward its future development.

"We are looking at these opportunities because anxious Chinese parents are never content with the diversity or the quality of education in China, not to mention that China's universal second-child policy is bringing more needs for educational resources," she said.

Bai Yunfeng, president of TAL Education Group, a leading K-12 after-school tutoring services provider in China, said his company will continue to focus on improving education quality.

"High-quality education has been and will always be a rare resource, so for education enterprises, the pursuit of quality will never end," he said, adding that TAL is also building connections between technology and the internet to expand its reach.