Alibaba and SoftBank Vision Fund helped the online education services provider close a series E-plus round that hiked its overall funding to more than $2.9bn.

China-based online tutoring platform developer Zuoyebang closed a $1.6bn series E-plus round yesterday featuring e-commerce group Alibaba and telecommunications and internet group SoftBank’s Vision Fund 1.

Hedge fund manager Tiger Global Management, venture capital firm Sequoia Capital China and private equity fund FountainVest Partners also participated in the round. It comes after Reuters reported in September this year the company was raising money at a $10bn valuation.

Zuoyebang runs an online education platform with 50 million daily active users and…

Robert Lavine

Robert Lavine is special features editor for Global Venturing.