Operator
女士们、先生们,感谢各位的耐心等待,欢迎参加好未来教育集团2014财年第四季度及全年业绩电话会议。目前,所有参会者均处于只听模式。会议将先进行演示,随后是问答环节。(接线员说明)我必须提醒您,本次会议正在录音,时间为2014年4月22日星期二。现在,我将会议交给今天的第一位发言人,李梅女士。谢谢您,女士。请开始。
Operator
Ladies and gentlemen thank you for standing by and welcome to the TAL Education Group Fourth Fiscal Quarter and Fiscal Year 2014 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. There will be a presentation followed by a question-and-answer session. (Operator Instructions) I must advise you that this conference is being recorded today, Tuesday, April 22, 2014. I would now like to hand the call over to your first speaker for today, Ms. Mei Li. Thank you ma’am. Please go ahead.
Mei Li
感谢各位今天参加好未来教育集团2014财年第四季度及全年业绩电话会议。第四财季及全年业绩公告已于今天早些时候发布,您可以在公司投资者关系网站或通过新闻专线找到副本。在本次电话会议中,您将听到首席财务官Joseph Kaufman先生的发言。在他完成准备好的发言后,Kaufman先生将回答您的问题。在继续之前,请注意今天的讨论将包含根据美国《1995年私人证券诉讼改革法案》安全港条款所作的前瞻性陈述。前瞻性陈述存在风险和不确定性,可能导致实际结果与我们当前的预期存在重大差异。潜在风险和不确定性包括但不限于向美国证券交易委员会提交的公开文件中概述的内容。有关这些风险和不确定性的更多信息,请参阅我们向SEC提交的文件。此外,我们的业绩公告和本次电话会议包含对某些非GAAP财务指标的讨论。请参阅我们的业绩公告,其中包含非GAAP指标与最直接可比的GAAP指标之间的调节表。现在,我将会议交给Joseph Kaufman先生。
Mei Li
Thank you all for joining us today for TAL Education Group’s Fourth Fiscal Quarter and Fiscal Year 2014 Earnings Conference Call. The fourth fiscal quarter and fiscal year earnings release was distributed earlier today and you may find a copy on the company IR website or through the Newswire. During this call, you will hear from Chief Financial Officer, Mr. Joseph Kaufman. Following his prepared remarks, Mr. Kaufman will be available to answer your questions. Before we continue, please note that the discussions today will contain forward-looking statements made under the Safe Harbor provisions of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from our current expectations. Potential risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to those outlined in the public filings with SEC. For more information about these risks and uncertainties, please refer to our filings with the SEC. Also our earnings release in this call includes discussions of certain non-GAAP financial measures. Please refer to our earnings release, which contains a reconciliation of the non-GAAP measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures. I would now like to turn the call over to Mr. Joseph Kaufman.
Joseph Kaufman
翻译中...
Joseph Kaufman
Thank you, Mei and thank you all for joining us on our earnings conference call for the fourth fiscal quarter and full fiscal year of 2014. We are pleased to report an excellent fourth quarter with revenues at the high end of our guidance and very strong bottom line results. Today, I will discuss the highlights for the quarter and full fiscal year. Next, I will update you on our online education initiatives and discuss our key themes for fiscal 2015. Finally, I will go over the financials with you. Net revenue for the fiscal fourth quarter increased 45.9% year-over-year to $87.0 million. Revenue growth was supported by a 38.8% increase in enrollments. Our core small-class offering comprised of Xueersi Peiyou and the ages 3 to 8 Mobby young learners business was again the main driver of our growth. We are pleased to report that each of the 15 cities in which we have operations delivered at least double-digits revenue growth in the quarter and 10 cities had triple-digits revenue growth. We also added a learning center in Jinan in February making it the 16th city in our national K-12 learning center network. We will begin regular test operations in Jinan starting with the summer term this year. As I explained when guiding for the quarter, we had some additional revenues from the first week of classes of the spring term captured in the fourth fiscal quarter due to the timing of Chinese New Year this year. Excluding this estimated RMB26 million impact, year-on-year revenue growth would have been approximately 38%. You may recall we had a similar windfall in the second quarter of fiscal 2014. Basically, the timing of Chinese New Year versus that of our fiscal year causes revenue tailwind in the second and fourth quarter of one year and some revenue headwind in the same periods of the following year. As it is a predictable variation, we are able to give you timely guidance on this. Small-class contributed 78% of fourth quarter revenues, one-on-one 19% and online 3%. In terms of revenue contribution for small-class, cities other than Beijing and Shanghai accounted for 40% of small-class revenues in the fourth quarter, which was consistent with the third quarter and compared to 29% during the same period last year. In addition to strong top line results, we had net income growth of 144.0% year-on-year. Gross margin expansion was the major driver of our improved profitability in the quarter. Gross margin increased by 570 basis points from 47.4% to 53.1% year-over-year. The gross margin improvement came primarily from the extra class in the fourth quarter as well as improved teacher and center utilization and our continued shift towards the higher margin small-class business away from one-on-one. Even as we achieved strong current revenue momentum we also invested in future capacity ahead of the summer term. We added this capacity to both new centers and more classrooms to existing centers. Net new small class classrooms totaled 194, which included the classrooms in the net eight new small class centers we added in the quarter. We also added one net new learning center for one-on-one taking our total learning center network to 274 centers, of which 184 were small class learning centers including four learning centers for our Mobby branded preschool and young learners age three to eight business and 90 for one-on-one. This concludes my review of the fourth fiscal quarter. Let me now give you a summary of our fiscal year 2014 ended on February 28, 2014. Fiscal 2014 was the year of outstanding progress in execution on plan in all directions operationally, financially and strategically. We managed 38.9% revenue growth for the year on gross profit margins of 51.7% and GAAP net income growth of 81.2%. And we delivered on plan to balance current growth opportunities with continued investments for future growth. We made great progress in expanding our capacity to handle the strong demand for our tutoring services reflected by year-on-year enrollment growth of 31.6%. This enrollment growth drove our business to exceed the 1 million annual enrollments milestone this fiscal year. We added a net of nearly 600 classrooms taking into account the net addition of 25 new learning centers with small class and the net reduction of six learning centers for one-on-one in fiscal 2014. Small class revenue growth in cities other than Beijing and Shanghai continue to be the main driver of our growth in fiscal 2014. Cities other than Beijing and Shanghai contributed 37% of small class revenues in fiscal 2014 compared to 25% in fiscal 2013. These cities also took a larger share of the overall enrollment growth representing 44% of small class enrollments in fiscal 2014 compared to the 31% in fiscal 2013. The small class business in Shanghai reaccelerated in the course of fiscal 2014 following a year in which we managed our growth in that city in order to refocus on teaching quality and curriculum. Gross margin improved by 290 basis points versus the previous year. This improved gross margin was driven by an extra week of classes in the second and fourth quarters this year given the timing of Chinese New Year in calendar years 2013 and 2014 as well as better teacher and center utilization and the shift towards the higher margins small class business away from one-on-one. We also achieved the bulk of our nearly 600 incremental classrooms capacity by adding classrooms to existing centers rather than adding incremental new centers an approach which was supportive to the gross margins. We were able to leverage SG&A through more efficient human resources management which contributed together with improved gross margins to operating margins expanding by 440 basis points compared to fiscal 2013. We also carefully managed our growing cash balance and optimized returns to higher interest income. All of these efforts resulted in strong growth in profitability and operating cash flow for the full fiscal year. In fiscal 2014 we delivered operating cash flow of over $100 million representing approximately 54% growth versus the previous year. Capital expenditure for the year was about $10.9 million representing a near 3.5% of revenues. The health of our business supported more management time and resources in fiscal 2014 to spend on future growth opportunities at the crossroads of where technology meets education particularly for new online and mobile product offerings. We have begun to reap some rewards from our efforts to be a technology-focused tutoring brand. Our mobile app, (indiscernible) were helping parent community, which we just launched this year is off to a good start an expansion of the strong organically built social community on eduu.com. We are happy also to be recognized by AC Nielsen and Sina in the Sina 2013 China Online Education Report as being the number one choice of online school by surveyed K-12 learners. In addition to the continued development of our online platform ads, eduu.com, xueersi.com and on mobile, we also upgraded our Intelligent Classroom System. ICS 3.0 uses enhanced media content and pads to make the classroom experience more interactive than ever. We also make key strategic investments in fiscal 2014. We acquired kaoyan.com, kaoyan.com, a website that helps students prepare for postgraduate admissions and made a minority investment in babytree.com, a leading online community for new parents. Both asses allow us to extend the lifetime value of our customers. With Babytree we gained access to a younger customer demographic which we believe over time will help feed into enrollments for our Mobby preschool and the pre-kindergarten business for our Xueersi Peiyou small class business. With Kaoyan we extend our services beyond the 12th grade so now students can stay with us even after they’ve left high school. Meanwhile our investment in duobei.com earlier in the year offers us valuable insight into the evolution of open platform online learning. These organically developed and strategic initiatives support our overall online strategy which I’ve discussed on previous calls. We continue to believe that online will not easily disrupt the K-12 space given consumer behavior and the relatively local nature of the content and curriculum requirements. However we do see implementation of Internet and mobile strategies as critical to maintain our differentiated strategy in the K-12 sector while increasing interaction frequency and duration with our key users. The first part of our online strategy is eduu.com and its affiliated websites including aoshu.com, zhongkao.com, gaokao.com, zuowen.com and now kayoan.com. The Jiajiaoban mobile app I mentioned earlier connects the online parent community on the eduu.com websites with their mobile devices. This is essentially a continuation of our longstanding O2O efforts to build a social community online that also helps bring students into our classrooms. Second, we continue to pursue a blended learning strategy offering online drills and/or apps for students to do exercises during the week while they’re away from our classes. We’re developing these tools through our X Peiyou for small class, i-Zhikang for one-on-one, i-Mobby for preschool and young learners business and other platforms. Online provides much more than simply an extra tool for tutoring. It helps us create an even stickier and more relevant community of students and parents connected to our brand and services. Third, online school at xueersi.com, xueersi.com continues to help us gain presence in cities where we do not yet have physical infrastructure as well as more enrollments from students in existing cities. As mentioned earlier our online school secures the number one ranking in the Sina 2013 China online education report issued by A.C. Nielsen and sina.com. This report based on online responses through sina.com and Sina Weibo with users of various K-12 online schools gives us a leading market share in the kindergarten through 12th grade online tutoring space with nearly 29% of surveyed users having taking classes at xueersi.com. Meanwhile we are testing having more administrative services for our learning centers move online such as class registration, refunds and switching of classes. In addition to convenience for parents and students there is potential for cost efficiency gains over time. Finally we’re beginning to experience with free online school, live classes online and education platform businesses through our beta products, Dahai and Haidian, Dahai and Haidian as well as via the minority stake investment in an education platform called duobei.com, duobei.com I mentioned earlier. Let me now turn to the key themes for fiscal 2015. Our key themes for fiscal 2015 you may recognize is mostly a continuation of the goals we’ve set out and delivered in 2014. Let me outline them here. Firstly we will continue to pursue growth through expansion and innovation. We added a learning center Jinan in the fourth quarter which along with three other new cities will begin operations in the second quarter of fiscal 2015. The demand for our businesses remained strong and we are positive in our outlook for ongoing growth momentum in fiscal 2015 based predominantly on enrollment growth. We will continue to pilot ICS 3.0 in select grade levels in Beijing and if successful we will rollout nationally. We will also innovate further to develop the blended learning model with mobile apps as the complementary feature to make learning more fun and effective for students. Secondly, we will continue to manage the balance between current and future growth. Even as we deliver strong growth with solid profitability and are blessed to be in a generally defensive sector, we are always on higher road for potential opportunities as well as disruptive changes. As always our investment focus is on the key growth drivers, new opportunities and operational business fundamentals to further strengthen our business model and distinguish our brand from the competition. Technological innovation will change the education sector in China as it has other traditional sectors. The exciting new opportunities we see all around TAL said now is the time to invest. The strong gains in profitability and profit margins during fiscal 2014 provide us with a sound financial footing to invest in technology and online initiatives to support our long-term future growth as opportunity presents itself, as before we will carefully weigh the pros and cons of growing our online and mobile presence organically or through the strategic investment. Thirdly, we continue to develop our people who it goes without saying our most valuable asset. We motivate our employees the strength of right balance between short-term and long-term growth of the company. In addition the revenue and profit are bonuses for key operations personnel are also tied to long-term oriented key performance indicators such as utilization rates of our facilities and student retention levels. The share grant we did last month at the beginning of the new fiscal year will vest over 6 to 10 years of support and reward long-term commitment to TAL. Fourthly, we will keep investing in back office capabilities especially in IT systems for better forecasting financial analysis, purchasing and control functions. An example of this commitment to continually improving our systems strength is our decision to work with Oracle Hyperion software for financial analysis and planning, which we believe will help us to budget for and react to the business environment ever more effectively. And finally we aim to continue to deliver on plan through solid execution as we have done in the past few years. Let me now go over the financials with you. We delivered $87.0 million in revenue in the quarter representing revenue growth of 45.9% versus the same period in the previous year. Driving the quarter’s revenue growth was strong enrollment growth of 38.8% combined with higher average selling prices. Total student enrollments increased to approximately 348,000 from approximately 250,700 in the same period one year ago. The increase in total student enrollments was driven primarily by increases of enrollments in the small class offerings. On the ASP side, the year-on-year ASP increase of 5.1% to $250 for the fourth fiscal quarter from $238 in the fourth quarter of the previous year was primarily driven by the hourly rate increases of the small class course offering and the foreign exchange rate fluctuation. Now, moving back to the total company numbers, cost of revenues increased by 29.9% to $40.8 million from $31.4 million in the same year ago quarter. The increase in cost of revenues was mainly due to an increase in teacher compensation, rental costs and other staff costs associated primarily with the expansion of learning center capacity as well as the increases in wages and teacher fees versus the year ago period. Non-GAAP cost of revenues which excluded share based compensation expenses increased by 29.8% to $40.8 million from $31.4 million in the fourth quarter fiscal year 2013. GAAP and non-GAAP gross profits for the fourth quarter were both $46.2 million as compared to both being $28.3 million for the same year ago period. GAAP and non-GAAP gross margin for the fourth quarter were 53.1% and 53.2% respectively compared to about 47.4% for the period – same period of last year. Selling and marketing expenses increased by 33.6% to US$10.2 million from US$7.6 million in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2013. Non-GAAP selling and marketing expenses, which excluded share-based compensation expenses, increased by 34.9% to US$9.9 million from US$7.3 million in the same period of last year. The increase of selling and marketing expenses in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2014 was primarily a result of an increase in compensation to sales and marketing staff to support a greater number of programs and service offerings versus the year ago period. General and administrative expenses increased by 51.9% to US$21.8 million from US$14.4 million in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2013. The increase in general and administrative expenses were mainly due to an increase in compensation to our G&A personnel in recognition of outperformance against budget and to support a greater number of programs and service offerings. Non-GAAP general and administrative expenses, which excluded share-based compensation expenses, increased by 51.1% to US$19.6 million from US$12.9 million in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2013. The above factors combined to give us operating income of US$14.4 million representing a year-over-year increase of 154.2%. Non-GAAP operating income increased 129.8% year-over-year to US$17.0 million. Operating margin in the fourth quarter was 16.5% as compared to 9.5% in the same period of the previous year. Non-GAAP operating margin was 19.5% as compared to 12.4% in the same period a year ago. Our net income for the quarter was US$16.7 million and increased by 144.0% year-over-year. Non-GAAP net income for the fourth quarter was US$19.3 million, up by 125.1% year-over-year. This gives us a net profit margin of 19.2% as compared to 11.5% in the same period of last year. Non-GAAP net profit margin was 22.2% versus 14.4% in the same period of last year. Basic and diluted net income per ADS were both US$0.21 for the quarter. Non-GAAP basic and diluted net income per ADS, which excluded share-based compensation expenses were US$0.25 and US$0.24 respectively. Now, moving to the year as a whole, we delivered revenue growth of 38.9% driven by enrollment growth of approximately 31.6% and ASP growth of 5.6%. We delivered US$313.9 million of net revenue from US$225.9 million in fiscal year 2013. Total student enrollments increased to approximately 1,073,950 from approximately 816,110 one year ago. The increase in total student enrollments was driven primarily by increases of enrollments in the small-class offerings. ASP increased by US$277 in fiscal year 2013 to US$292 in fiscal year 2014. The growth in ASP was mainly driven by the hourly rate increases of the small class course offerings and the foreign exchange rate fluctuation. One-on-one tutoring contributed 20% of revenues for fiscal 2014 compared to 23% from fiscal 2013. Cost of revenues increased by 30.9% to US$151.5 million from US$115.7 million in fiscal year 2013. The increase in cost of revenues was mainly due to an increase in teacher compensation, rental costs and other staff costs associated primarily with an expansion of learning center capacity. Non-GAAP cost of revenues, which excluded share-based compensation expenses, increased by 31.0% to US$151.5 million from US$115.6 million in fiscal year 2013. GAAP and non-GAAP gross profit were both increased by 47.3% to US$162.4 million from US$110.2 million and US$110.3 million respectively in fiscal year 2013. GAAP and non-GAAP gross margin for the fiscal year 2014 were both 51.7% as compared to 48.8% for the prior year. Selling and marketing expenses increased by 29.2% to US$35.8 million from US$27.7 million in fiscal year 2013. Non-GAAP selling and marketing expenses, which excluded share-based compensation expenses, increased by 33.8% to US$34.6 million, from US$25.9 million in fiscal year 2013. The increase of selling and marketing expenses in fiscal year 2014 was primarily a result of an increase of sales and marketing staff and related compensation to support an expanded number of cities in which the company had learning center operations and a greater number of programs and service offerings. General and administrative expenses increased by 37.5% to US$70.3 million from US$51.1 million in fiscal year 2013. The increase in general and administrative expenses was mainly due to an increase in compensation for our general and administrative personnel, the depreciation of office space purchased in Beijing, and an increase in professional service fees. Non-GAAP general and administrative expenses, which excluded share-based compensation expenses, increased by 41.1% to US$63.2 million from US$44.8 million in fiscal year 2013. Operating income increased by 82.7% to US$57.4 million from US$31.4 million in fiscal year 2013. Non-GAAP operating income, which excluded share-based compensation expenses, increased by 65.6% to US$65.7 million, from US$39.7 million in fiscal year 2013. GAAP and non-GAAP operating margin for the fiscal year 2014 were 18.3% and 20.9% respectively as compared to 13.9% and 17.6% respectively for fiscal year 2013. Net income increased by 81.2% to US$60.6 million from US$33.4 million in fiscal year 2013. Non-GAAP net income, which excluded share-based compensation expenses, increased by 65.3% to US$69.0 million from US$41.7 million in fiscal year 2013. This gives us a net profit margin of 19.3% as compared to 14.8% of last year. Non-GAAP net profit margin was 22.0% versus 18.5% for the fiscal year 2013. Basic and diluted net income per ADS were US$0.77 and US$0.76 respectively in fiscal year 2014. Non-GAAP basic and non-GAAP diluted net income per ADS, which excluded share-based compensation expenses, were US$0.88 and US$0.86 respectively. From the balance sheet as of February 28, 2014, the company had US$269.9 million of cash and cash equivalents and nil of term deposits as compared to US$185.1 million of cash and cash equivalents and US$24.1 million of term deposits as of February 28, 2013. Net cash provided by operating activities for the fiscal year 2014 was approximately US$100.5 million representing a year-over-year increase of approximately 53.6%. Capital expenditures for the fiscal year 2014 were US$10.9 million, representing an increase of US$4.0 million from US$6.9 million in fiscal year 2013. The increase was mainly due to leasehold improvements and the purchase of servers, computers, software systems and other hardware to support the company’s operations. As of February 28, 2014, the company’s deferred revenue balance was US$132.4 million as compared to US$102.5 million as of February 28, 2013, representing a year-over-year increase of 29.2%. Based on the company’s current estimate, total net revenues for the first quarter of fiscal year 2015 are expected to be between US$85.9 million and US$88.4 million, representing an increase of 40% to 44% on a year-on-year basis, assuming no material change in exchange rates. The first quarter of 2015 includes one more weekend of spring term classes versus the same period in fiscal 2014. Excluding the estimated RMB29 million to RMB30 million impact to this extra weekend, the year-on-year revenue increase is estimated between 32% and 35%, again assuming no material changes in exchange rates. That concludes my prepared remarks. Operator, I am now ready to take questions.
Operator
(接线员指示) 第一个问题来自高盛的分析师方菲。请提问。
Operator
(Operator Instructions) Your first question comes from the line of Fei Fang from Goldman Sachs. Please ask your question.
Fei Fang
你好,Joe和Mei。感谢回答我的问题。业绩表现疲软。我的第一个问题是,在你们新增的190间教室中,能否按城市提供大致分布情况?以及你们对未来扩张的地理重点有何考虑?谢谢。
Fei Fang
Hi, Joe and Mei. Thanks for taking my questions. Weak set of results. My first question is among the 190 new classrooms that you have added, could you provide a rough breakdown by city and how do you think about the geographical focus of your future expansion? Thanks.
Joseph Kaufman
好的。Fei,我将按学习中心来给你说明。在北京,我们新增了三个学习中心,同时停办了一个课程,净增一个。在天津,本季度我们新增了两个小班学习中心。在西安,我们新增了一个小班和一个一对一学习中心。在南京,我们新增了一个小班学习中心。在武汉,我们新增了一个小班学习中心。在郑州,我们新增了一个小班学习中心。重庆新增一个,沈阳新增一个,济南是本季度新进入的城市,也新增了一个。这样我们净增了8个小班和1个一对一,总共9个。
Joseph Kaufman
Sure. I will give it you by learning centers, Fei. So, in Beijing, we added three learning centers and discontinued course where we net down one in Beijing. In Shanghai – in Tianjin rather, we were up two small-class learning centers in the quarter. In Xi`an, we added one small class and one one-on-one learning center. In Nanjing, we were up one small class learning center. In Wuhan, we were up one small class learning center. In Zhengzhou, we were up one small class learning center. Chongqing was one, Shenyang was one, and Jinan is the city we entered in the quarter, the new city was one as well. So that brought us to a net of 8 small class and 1 one-on-one to get us to 9 in total.
Fei Fang
好的。那么从数学上看就是这样。是否可以合理地说,未来重点将更广泛地放在北京以外城市的新增学习中心上?
Fei Fang
Right. So, that’s all over the math. Would it be fair to say that going forward, the focus will be more broad-based new app centers in Beijing (indiscernible) your cities?
Joseph Kaufman
是的。我认为在北京更多是机会性的。我们可能在年底前看到将较小中心整合为较大中心的机会。所以我仍然认为净增的大部分可能来自北京以外的城市。
Joseph Kaufman
Yes. I mean, I think that in Beijing you can see it’s more opportunistic. So, we maybe at the end of and at least see an opportunity to consolidate from smaller centers to larger centers. So, I still think that the bulk of the net adds will probably be coming from cities outside of Beijing.
Fei Fang
明白了,很好。我的第二个问题是关于外汇的,人民币最近停止了对美元的升值,你认为这对你们的盈利,特别是其他收入项目会产生什么影响?在提供指引时,你们使用的基础外汇假设是什么?
Fei Fang
Got it, great. My second question is on FX, so renminbi has recently stopped appreciating against U.S. dollars, so how do you think about the impact on your earnings, especially on the – regarding the other income line? And what will be the underlying FX assumption that you are working with in providing the guidance?
Joseph Kaufman
好的。关于人民币,我们尽量不做汇率预测。所以在我对第一季度的指引中,我假设汇率没有重大变化。我没有假设人民币会大幅贬值,也没有假设会大幅升值。关于第一季度,我认为当你考虑其他收入时,这是个好问题。今年的其他收入已经低于往年,当然,对我们来说其他收入的一个重要因素是离岸美元产生的汇兑收益。展望未来,部分原因是如果人民币汇率不变,我们预计汇兑收益不会那么大。此外,我们离岸美元现在比以前少了,这也会影响从这些离岸美元中能够获得的汇兑收益金额。
Joseph Kaufman
Sure. So, in terms of renminbi, we try not to make currency calls. So, in my guidance for the first quarter, I assumed no significant change in exchange rates. So, I am not assuming that the renminbi will go down in a big way and I am also not assuming they will go up in a big way. In terms of my Q1, I think that when you think about other income, that’s a good question. Other income already this year was lower than in previous years, other income, of course, a big factor that for us as exchange gain on the U.S. dollars that we have offshore. So, on a going forward basis, part of it will be the exchange gain we are not expecting to be as large for the renminbi if at all. And then you also had the fact that our offshore dollars are less now than they were before, so that there is also that will have an impact on the amount of exchange gain you are able to derive from those offshore dollars.
Fei Fang
明白了,很好。我的最后一个问题是,我注意到本季度你们新增了一个一对一学习中心,这是否表明你们正在恢复至康品牌的增长模式?
Fei Fang
Got it, great. My last question is that I noticed that you added one one-on-one learning center during the quarter, so is that – does it indicate that you are back into the growth mode for the Zhikang brand?
Joseph Kaufman
我们正在继续管理一对一业务的增长。因此,您会看到全年一对一业务占收入的比例为20%,这与我之前几个季度给出的指引一致。我们预计小班课和在线课程业务在未来几年的增长速度都将超过一对一业务。因此,您应该预期一对一业务占收入的比例将进一步下降。这并不意味着在特定市场没有一对一业务的机会,西安就是这样一个市场,我们的小班课业务相当强劲,而作为小班课业务补充的一对一业务也增长得很好。因此,我们将机会性地寻找一对一业务的机会,尤其是在北京以外的城市,这些城市的一对一业务渗透率仍然相对较低。
Joseph Kaufman
We are continuing to manage the growth of our one-on-one business. So, you will see for the full year, it was 20% as a percentage of revenues, which is consistent with what I guided in previous quarters. And we expect small class and our online courses business to both grow faster than one-on-one in these coming years. So, you should expect that to come down further by a percentage of revenue going forward. That doesn’t mean that there aren’t opportunities in select markets for one-on-one and Xi`an will be such a market, where our small class business is quite strong and one-on-one as the complement to our small class business has also grown quite well. So, we will opportunistically look for one-on-one opportunities, especially in the cities outside of Beijing, where one-on-one is still relatively under-penetrated.
Fei Fang
很好。谢谢,Joe。
Fei Fang
Great. Thanks, Joe.
Joseph Kaufman
谢谢,Fei。
Joseph Kaufman
Thanks, Fei.
Operator
非常感谢。下一个问题来自摩根士丹利的Timothy Chan。请提问。
Operator
Thank you very much. Your next question comes from the line of Timothy Chan from Morgan Stanley. Please ask a question.
Timothy Chan
嗨,Joe和Mei。祝贺你们取得非常强劲的业绩,感谢回答我的问题。我的问题实际上是关于你们在线教育战略的后续问题。正如你们所知,一些在线玩家现在正在进入这个领域,您如何看待竞争格局的变化,以及您认为好未来相对于这些在线平台有哪些竞争优势?谢谢。
Timothy Chan
Hi, Joe and Mei. Congratulations on the very strong results and thanks for taking my questions. My question is actually a follow-up to your online education strategy. As you may know, some online players are now entering in this space, how do you see in terms of the change in any competitive dynamics and what they think is the competitive edge of TAL with these online platforms? Thank you.
Joseph Kaufman
很好,谢谢Timothy。是的,我们很高兴看到在线教育领域受到很多关注。我们认为其他可能进入这一领域的、更偏向互联网相关公司的优势在于,它们更像是平台业务。因此,它们拥有大量用户,并寻求聚合内容提供给用户。我认为这是一种不同类型的业务,与我们试图实现的目标不同。通过我们的学而思网校,我们通过客户体验和产品本身(即每个市场的内容和课程)进行差异化。在体验方面,我们希望强调服务,并作为值得信赖的教育顾问陪伴学生,因为我们专注于K-12教育。在产品方面,我们投入大量资源来了解每个本地市场的地方内容和课程。因此,这与平台业务非常不同,我们专注于产品业务,即我们的B2C主张,我们基于对K-12领域的深入了解来实现差异化。
Joseph Kaufman
Great, thanks Timothy. So, yes, we are happy to see a lot of interest in the online education space. The way we think about the advantage of the other players that may be going in more internet related companies is they are more of a platform business. So for them they have lots of users and they are looking to aggregate content and provide it to their users. So I think that that is a different kind of business and what we are trying to achieve. With our xueersi.com online school we differentiate through both the customer experience and the product itself, so the content and curriculum in each market. So, on the experience side we want to emphasize service and being there for our students as a trusted education advisor given our sole focus on K-12 education. And then in terms of the product, we spend a lot of resources in terms of understanding the local content and curriculum of each local market. So it’s very different from a platform business, we are focusing on a product business, our B2C proposition where we differentiate based on our deep knowledge of the K-12 sector.
Timothy Chan
谢谢。这非常有帮助。
Timothy Chan
Thank you. That’s very helpful.
Joseph Kaufman
谢谢,Timothy。
Joseph Kaufman
Thank you, Timothy.
Operator
谢谢。下一个问题来自TH Capital的Tian Hou。请提问。
Operator
Thank you. Your next question comes from the line of Tian Hou from TH Capital. Please ask the question.
Tian Hou
嗨,Joe和Mei。祝贺你们这个季度表现不错。抱歉,我有个关于你们ASP(平均销售价格)的问题。如果我看增长驱动因素,我认为大部分增长确实来自入学人数增长这一点相当健康。我认为对于教育预算来说,无论是家庭层面还是整个社会层面,相对于CPI(消费者价格指数),我们都有某种程度的增长,你们基本上与CPI增长保持一致。我想知道未来是否有提价计划,这是第一个问题。第二个问题,在内容类别方面,我知道你们投入了大量研发资源开发新内容或新内容形式。我想知道是否会在内容组合中添加新的内容类别,这是第二个问题。我就先问到这里,Joe你可以开始回答了吗?
Tian Hou
Hi Joe and Mei. Congratulations on the good quarter. Sorry, so I have a question related to your ASPs, if I look at the growth drivers I think it’s quite healthy that most of the growth are really coming from the enrollment growth and I think for the education budget actually in terms of families or the whole society to CPIs, we all have some kind of increase, you guys have been pretty much in line with the CPI growth and I wonder if there is any plans going forward to increase the price, that’s question number one. Question number two, so in the content categories I know you are putting a lot of R&D efforts in developing new content or new formats of content. I wonder if there are new categories of the content are you going to add in your content portfolio, that’s the second question. So I will stop right here, Joe you can start give us answer?
Joseph Kaufman
好的,非常感谢,田。关于平均售价(ASP),我们确实有计划从夏季学期开始在北京、上海、深圳以及其他一些市场提价。因此,今年我们的小班业务组合中将包含价格上调。我们通常会向续读学生提供优惠券,以鼓励留存并缓和价格上调的影响。今年我们很可能也会继续这样做。至于您看到的另一个因素,实际上是产品组合问题。这里有几个组合问题:首先,在小班业务内部,我们正从北京和上海以外的城市获得大量增长。这些城市的平均售价低于北京、上海、广州和深圳(这几个城市的水平大致相当,北京略高)。因此,即使在小班培优业务内部,混合平均售价也自然会低于我们部分精选城市(在这些城市,我们可能会提价10%或更多)。所以,在特定城市,我们可能会参考CPI进行定价,但我们存在结构性转变,并且我们并非在所有城市都基于其发展水平进行提价。其次,当您审视我们的产品线时,一对一业务(高ASP业务)在总收入中的占比正在下降,从上一财年(2013财年)的23%降至2014财年的20%,并且我们预计今年会进一步降低。因此,这也会对您在财报中看到的混合平均售价产生影响,缓和整体混合平均售价的增幅。再者,在线课程在入学人数方面增长相当不错,我们实际上预计其明年增速将超过一对一业务。这是一项低ASP产品,因为请记住,对于在线课程,我们正尝试推出试听课程,其中许多课程每小时仅收费20元人民币,且可能只持续几个小时。这样我们可以为初次接触我们课程的人提供一个不错的试听产品。以上就是我对ASP的描述。我认为您说得对,我们是一家以入学人数增长为驱动的企业,并且我们寻求继续保持这一模式。我们确实认为这是实现营收增长最健康的方式,并且我们相信凭借我们的品牌和定价能力,如果现在在价格上留有一些余地,未来我们可以加以利用。这就是我对整体价格上调的看法。我提到了小班提价,我们也可能对一对一业务提价,只是时间会稍晚一些,通常一对一业务提价会在9月而非夏季学期进行,但我们需要继续观察一对一业务如何发展,并且我们很可能在与小班提价相同的市场进行一对一业务提价。田,关于ASP方面我就说这些。在课程内容组合方面,我们正在做几件事:一是科目方面,我们更侧重于英语和中文作文。您可能已经在媒体上看到,我们最近与剑桥大学出版社签署了一项关于名为
Joseph Kaufman
Okay great. Thanks Tian. In terms of ASP as we do have plans to increase price beginning with the summer term in Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen and some other markets as well. So there will be price increase as part of the mix this year in our small class business. We typically give a coupon to recurring student to encourage retention and moderate into the price increase. So we will probably continue to do that again this year. In terms of what you are seeing another factor is actually mix. So there are a couple of mix issues. One is within small class we are getting a lot of growth from cities outside of Beijing and Shanghai. And there are going to lower ASPs in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen which are typically roughly the same level, Beijing is slightly higher. So that’s going to naturally cause ASP on a blended basis even within the small class Peiyou business to be lower than in some of our select cities where we may be taking 10% or more percent price increase. So in a given city we are likely to be a bud CPI, but we had structural shifts and we are not taking a price increase across all of our cities based on where they are in their level of development. And then when you look across our products one-on-one which is the high ASP business becoming a lower percentage of revenues, so it went from 23% in last year fiscal 2013 to 20% in fiscal 2014 and then we are expecting to be lower again this year. So that will also on a blended ASP basis which you see in the release have an impact in moderating the overall blended ASP increase. And then online courses is growing quite well and in terms of enrollments and we actually expected to grow faster than one-on-one next year. so that’s the low ASP product, because remember with online courses we are trying to put on a trial so many of those classes are only RMB20 an hour and maybe only a few hours in duration. So we can have a nice trial product for people that are new to our classes. So that’s the way I would characterize the ASP. I think for us you’re right to point out that we’re an enrollment growth driven business and we seek to continue to be an enrollment growth driven business, we do think that that’s the healthiest way to derive your top-line growth and we believe that we have the brand and the pricing power that if we’re leaving a little bit on the table in terms of price now that’s something that we can use later. So that’s what I’d say about the overall price increase. I mentioned the small class price increase, we may also take a price increase for one-on-one, it will just be a little bit later, typically one-on-one it would be in September rather than in the summer term, but we’ll have to continue to see how one-on-one continue to evolve and we likely take that one-on-one price increase in the same markets where we’ve taken the small class increase. So that’s what I’d say on the ASP side, Tian. In terms of content portfolio there are a couple of things that we’re doing, one is in terms of subjects we’re focusing more on English and one on Chinese composition. So you may have seen in the media that we recently signed an agreement with Cambridge University Press for content called Hello English which we think will help us to go after the opportunity at the younger age groups because as you’re aware there was a change in the policy related to the waiting of English in the Zhongkao and Gaokao as well as kids studying English in the public schools, they won’t be studying it before the fourth grade so that provides an opportunity to do more with conversational English at a younger age group because we believe parents will still want their kids to get exposure to English, it will just be if the schools aren’t providing it in the public form that gives an opportunity for training institution. So that’s one area where we’re putting a lot of resources this year. The other is Chinese composition again there was a policy related reason there where Chinese compositions can become more important in terms of Gaokao and Zhongkao so we’re putting more resources against Chinese composition. In terms of subjects I would say that’s our focus. In terms of age groups I think that the younger age groups upright down to kindergarten its probably an opportunity for us that we’re going to spend a little bit more time and effort on obviously junior high and high school become more important as we develop from primary to junior to high school in each of our markets, we start with primary school and then move to junior high and high school so that depends on the evolution of the market. And then in terms of format I mentioned in the call about ICS 3.0, so in addition to the interactive whiteboards that we had before where kids would have to go up to the front of the room and interact to the whiteboard. We’re actually making even more interactive where every kids gets a pad when they come into the classroom and they can actually answer questions boom right on the spot with a teacher there and then you can – the other kids can see that interaction on the whiteboard. So we think that’s going to just make it ever more interactive and exciting for kids to be part of our classes. So that’s the big thing we’re doing in the classroom in terms of how the format is content. We’re focusing first on Beijing and select age groups mainly junior high to start and then we’ve gotten some initial feedback there and if it continues to be good we’ll expand it to other age groups within Beijing and then potentially other cities if it continues to be good. The main push for that will be more like the summer term. Right now we’re kind of in a pilot for that. And then I mentioned on the release the different things we’re doing online so there is prerecorded video content through our xueersi.com online courses and then you have dahai.com which is in a beta stage which is free online school, Haidian which is also in a beta stage which is live online. So we’re doing a lot of experimentation in terms of presentation online as well.
Tian Hou
这非常有帮助。谢谢你,Joe。
Tian Hou
That’s very helpful. Thank you, Joe.
Joseph Kaufman
谢谢,Tian。
Joseph Kaufman
Thanks, Tian.
Operator
非常感谢。下一个问题来自Jefferies的Clara Fan。请提问。
Operator
Thank you very much. Your next question comes from the line of Clara Fan from Jefferies. Please ask the question.
Clara Fan
你好。感谢回答我的问题。我有几个小问题。首先,能否提供2015年第一季度和全年目标学习中心开设数量及费用扩张的指引,以及开设时间会更集中在上半年还是下半年?其次,您提到在线收入和小班课收入在2015财年及以后可能会比一对一业务增长更快,我想了解我们应该预期什么样的收入贡献比例。最后,我想知道上个季度的利用率与去年同期相比如何,以及2015财年的目标利用率是多少?谢谢。
Clara Fan
Hi hello. Thank you for taking my question. I have a small question. Firstly, can you give us the guidance on your targeted number of center openings and fee expansion in first quarter ’15 and the full year ’15 and whether the openings will be more secured towards the first half or the second half. And secondly, you mentioned that the online revenue and small classes revenue will probably be growing faster than one-on-one going to fiscal year ’15 and so on, so I am just wondering what kind of revenue contribution should we be looking at. And lastly, we saw that – I was wondering what was the utilization last quarter compared to a year ago and what that target for fiscal year ‘15? Thank you.
Joseph Kaufman
好的,我将分别回答这些问题。第一个关于学习中心的问题,去年我们新增了19个学习中心,根据计划,我们预计今年至少新增25个学习中心。当然,我们进入的每个新城市都会开设一个学习中心。所以除了G9之外,我们还会增加三个。我们还将增加新的学习中心,因为过去几年我们进入了一些城市,但在这些城市的学习中心数量仍少于10个,我们认为现在是继续在这些城市增加新中心的合适发展阶段。这就是关于学习中心的想法。当然,我们也会继续在现有学习中心增加教室方面保持机会主义态度。显然,这是从运营成本中获得杠杆的最佳方式,但这并不是完全可以依赖的。这取决于整体占用情况以及您与房东的谈判能力等。这就是我对学习中心方面的看法,它们将主要由小班课驱动。然后我想说,时间上会略微偏向今年上半年,因为我们希望在夏季之前尽可能多地开设学习中心。当然,这将取决于执行情况以及我们能否以合适的价格找到理想的位置,但这是我们的目标。我想这就是关于学习中心的问题。关于您问的利用率问题,本季度的利用率比去年同期高出约10%。这相当不错,而且我们已经连续几个季度保持这种增长。我认为未来您应该预期利用率增长会更接近个位数,因为利用率在某个点会达到上限。所以我不一定预期明年会有那么大的增长,但我们仍然预期在某些市场(如北京等)获得利用率提升。您还有第三个问题,提醒我一下,Clara。
Joseph Kaufman
Sure, I will handle each of those questions separately. The first question related to learning centers, we added 19 learning centers last year, based on plan we expect to add 25 incremental learning centers at least this year. Of course, we will add one learning center in each of the new cities we are entering. So in addition to G9 there will three more that we will be adding. We are also going to be adding new learning centers because there are a number of cities where over the last few years we have entered, but we are still less than 10 learning centers, so we feel like it’s the right stage of development for us to continue to add new centers in those cities. So that’s the idea in terms of learning centers. Of course, we will also continue to be opportunistic in terms of adding classrooms to existing learning centers. Obviously that’s the best way to get leverage from your operating costs, but it’s not exactly something you can depend on. It depends on the overall occupancy situation and how you are able to negotiate with the landlord etcetera. So that’s what I would say on the learning center side, they will be primarily driven by small class. And then I would say there will be slightly swung ended towards the first half of the year as we do like to get learning centers in before the summer season as possible. That will of course depend on execution and that we are able to find the right locations that we want at the right price, of course, but that’s the goal, so that’s I think the question related to learning centers. In terms of you asked the question about utilization, the utilization was about 10% higher this quarter than the same period last year. So that’s quite good and we have done that now for a couple of quarters. I think going forward you should expect it to be more like single digits increase in terms of utilization, utilization which is a ceiling at some point. So I wouldn’t necessarily expect that much next year what we do still expect to get utilization gains particularly in certain markets like Beijing and others. You had a third question remind me Clara.
Clara Fan
是的,关于小班课、一对一和在线业务在2015财年的收入贡献预期?
Clara Fan
Yes, on the revenue contribution we expected for small class, one-on-one and online in fiscal year ’15?
Joseph Kaufman
对的。我认为(听不清)业务的收入占比将从20%下降,很难确切说会降到多少,可能在17%到18%的范围内作为今年收入的百分比,这目前只是一个猜测。在线业务可能从3%上升到大约4%作为明年收入的百分比。其余部分将是小班课。所以我们不是在谈论戏剧性的变化,而是在谈论轻微的调整。
Joseph Kaufman
Right. So, I think that the (indiscernible) revenue will come down from 20%, it’s hard to say exactly how much maybe in kind of the 17% to 18% range as a percentage of revenue this coming year, that’s a guess at this point. The online may go up from 3% to say 4% as a percentage of revenue next year. And then the remainder will be small class. So we are not talking dramatic changes, we are talking about slight moderation.
Clara Fan
那么关于eduu.com的一个后续问题,我们是否认为可能会维持eduu.com的收入贡献?是会保持在相同的最低水平,还是会下降到15%,或者长期来看可能会保持在这个范围内?
Clara Fan
So just a follow-up question on the eduu.com, so do we think that we will probably maintain like the revenue contribution from eduu.com would it be same minimum it will be down to 15% or probably will stay at around that range in the long-term?
Joseph Kaufman
我认为从长期来看,一对一业务的贡献百分比可能会继续下降。它将继续增长,只是我们认为小班课和在线课程业务的增长速度会更快。
Joseph Kaufman
I mean I think that over the long-term you could see one-on-one continued to go down as a percentage of contribution. It’s going to continue to grow. We just think that the small class and online courses businesses will grow faster.
Clara Fan
还有一个关于您提到的三个新城市的快速后续问题,是否有特定的城市是我们认为您会进入的?
Clara Fan
And one quick follow-up question on the three new cities that you mentioned, is there – are there particular cities that we think you are?
Joseph Kaufman
有的,这些城市已经确定并准备就绪,但出于竞争原因,我们不会披露具体是哪些城市,我们已经在这些城市中布局了。
Joseph Kaufman
There are, they are already said and ready to go, but for competitive reasons, we won’t disclose them and so we are in them.
Clara Fan
再次强调,我们更多考虑的是在上半年进入这三个新城市。
Clara Fan
Again, we are more thinking of them in the first half for these three new cities as well.
Joseph Kaufman
不,不,它们应该在第一季度。所以,我们认为到五月底,我们将在大多数这些城市中开展业务。
Joseph Kaufman
No, no, they should be in the first quarter. So, we think by the end of May, you would have – we would be in most of them.
Clara Fan
好的,非常感谢。
Clara Fan
Okay, thank you very much.
Joseph Kaufman
谢谢,Clara。
Joseph Kaufman
Thank you, Clara.
Operator
非常感谢。下一个问题来自Oppenheimer的Ella Ji。请提问。
Operator
Thank you very much. Your next question comes from the line of Ella Ji from Oppenheimer. Please ask the question.
Ella Ji
谢谢。祝贺本季度业绩强劲。我的第一个问题是关于你们的增长率,能否大致分解一下现有中心的有机增长与新中心带来的增长?另外,展望整个FY '15财年,随着我们开始面临——随着我们开始失去同比比较的有利因素,能否谈谈你们对增长趋势的预期?
Ella Ji
Thank you. Congratulations on strong quarter. My first question is with regards to your growth rate, could you breakdown your growth rate by organic growth in existing centers versus the growth from the new centers in the ballpark? And also as we are looking to the full year FY ‘15, can you talk about your expectations of the growth trend as we begin to face – as we begin to lose the benefits in the year-over-year comp?
Joseph Kaufman
好的。那么,你的第一个问题,我没有确切的数字可以提供,这与我之前和Clara谈到的利用率情况基本一致,因为我认为在我们的行业中,人们可以将利用率视为零售行业的同店销售增长。所以,我认为我们的增长将主要由产能增加驱动,即新开设中心或在现有中心增加新教室,虽然仍会有同店增长成分,但比重较小。今年,如果你看许多市场的利用率改善,达到了10%。这是一个相当健康的同店增长型数字。展望未来,我认为这个数字将下降到更接近个位数的水平。关于营收增长数字,你说得对,今年的同比基数会比往年更具挑战性。是的,一方面是在今年Q3和Q4,我们的基数比往年要低。另外我也提到了春节的影响,今年我们在Q2和Q4会面临一些阻力。所以,Q2和Q4是需要关注的季度,同比比较可能会稍微困难一些。但尽管如此,我不提供全年营收指引,不过根据我们内部的预算,我们目标是实现至少35%的营收增长。所以,我们对营收增长仍然相当有信心。
Joseph Kaufman
Right, okay. So, your first question, I don’t have exact numbers for you for that, it’s kind of in line with what I talked about with Clara in terms of utilization, because I think one way to think about utilization in our sectors as people will think about same-store sale growth in our retail sectors. So, I think we are going to be primarily driven by capacity increases, i.e., new stores or new classrooms to existing centers, because there still be a same-store growth component, but less. So this year, if you look at the utilization improvement in many markets, it was 10%. So that’s a pretty healthy same-store growth type number. And then on a going forward basis, I think that that number is going to go down to more like a single-digit number. In terms of the revenue growth number, I think you are right to say that there will be some harder comps this year than in previous years. I mean, yes, one is that in Q3, Q4 this year, we are pipelining a lower base than in previous years. And then also I mentioned the Chinese New Year impact which this year we have a bit of headwind in Q2 and Q4. So, Q2 and Q4 would be the ones to lookout for in terms of where the comps maybe a little bit more difficult, but that said well, I don’t provide full year guidance on revenues internally according to our budget, we are shooting for at least 35% top line growth. So, we are still pretty confident in terms of the top line.
Ella Ji
谢谢。这非常有帮助。我的第二个问题是,你们显然在线上提供了更多新服务,也在课堂上增加了更多互动服务。能否谈谈在你们现在提供的各项新服务中,哪些最受学生和家长欢迎?随着你们继续投资,你们内部是否有任何投资回报目标?最后,能否将你们当前的服务与同行——与竞争对手的服务进行比较?
Ella Ji
Thank you. And that’s very helpful. And then my second question is you – obviously you provided a lot more new offerings on online and also more interactive services in class. Can you talk about among other things you now provide, what are the new things that’s most welcomed or most popular by the like students and their parents? And as you continue to invest, what do you think is there anything like return on the investment target that you have internally? And just lastly, could you compare your current offering to the peers – to the ones that your peers have?
Joseph Kaufman
好的。那么,在线上方面,关键有两点:一是客户体验,二是产品质量。这就是我们在所有线上业务中努力做好的事情。因此,你会看到我们尝试用不同方式来实现这一目标,无论是直播课程中我们试图与学生进行更多直接互动,还是为录播课程增加直播元素,打造类似翻转课堂的模式——即通过录播视频内容传授知识,同时为学生提供练习机会、与老师进行实时互动,或是通过应用程序或其他在线练习帮助孩子们在周中进行练习。所以,客户体验——与学生进行高质量互动并提供良好服务——这是关键之一。第二是产品本身,我们相信这在很大程度上取决于我们对内容和课程的深刻理解。因此,我认为这两点正是我们在电话会议中提到的所有不同在线产品中,以及之前回答Tian的问题时所努力追求的方向。至于我们与竞争对手的比较,我认为这最好还是由你们来做调研分析。对我们而言,我们专注于K-12教育,专注于我之前谈到的线上战略中的关键领域:从社交平台提供O2O社区以吸引用户进入我们的课堂,到提供辅助学习,再到为K-12家长提供顶级的在线课程解决方案。同时,我们还在尝试许多其他新颖且可能具有颠覆性、或至少能在行业内形成差异化优势的创新模式,如翻转课堂、在线直播等。Ella,我是否已回答了你的问题?
Joseph Kaufman
Okay. So, in terms of online, what works are two things, one is the customer experience and two is the quality of the product. So, that’s what we are trying to get right in everything we do online. And so you will see us experimenting with different ways of achieving that, whether it’s life where we are trying to have more direct interaction with students, whether it’s adding life to pre-recorded and so doing something more like a flip classroom, where you have the prerecorded video content, which is transferring knowledge to them offering students the opportunity for practice, to have live interaction with teachers, whether it’s apps or other drills online to help kids to be able to do practice exercises during the week. So that’s one thing that’s key, the customer experience having high quality interactions with students and providing good service to students. The second is the product itself and we believe that a lot of that depends on our deep knowledge of the content and the curriculum. So I think that those are the two things that we are trying to do across all of those different online products that I mentioned on the call and then in response to Tian’s question earlier. In terms of how we compare to competitors, I think that’s better really just for you guys to do the research and see. I think that for us we are focusing on K-12, we are focusing on those key areas that I talked about in terms of our online strategy from social platform providing that O2O community that helps to bring people into our classrooms to provide a lending learning to providing a top online courses solution for K-12 parents. And then we are experimenting with a lot of other new and different things that could potentially be disruptive or at least differentiating in the sector like flip classroom like live online, etcetera. Have I answered your questions, Ella?
Ella Ji
是的,这确实很有帮助。只是一个快速的后续问题:我想知道,随着所有这些客户体验的改善,你认为它们最终会帮助增加你们的招生人数吗?还是你认为目前可能只是停留在改善客户体验的层面——这当然对你们的长期业务有帮助,但你们并不期望这些新服务能对招生产生帮助?
Ella Ji
Yes, that’s certainly helpful. Just a quick follow-up, I am just wondering if with all those improved customer experiences, do you think they will help grow your enrollments eventually or you think at this point it probably will just stay as like better customer experiences which will certainly help with your business in the long-term, but you are not expecting these new offerings to help with your enrollment?
Joseph Kaufman
嗯,我的意思是,我们已经看到在线课程对招生做出了贡献——在线课程在第四季度占招生份额的11%。所以我们确实看到了效果。年初至今,这一比例约为13%。因此,我认为我们持续抱有很高的期望,相信在线课程不仅能改善客户体验,还能推动招生增长。正如我提到的,在线课程的ASP(平均售价)较低。因此,我们预计其对收入的贡献将继续低于对招生的贡献。
Joseph Kaufman
Well, I mean, we are already seeing an enrollment contribution from online or online courses had 11% share of enrollments in Q4. So we are seeing them. Year-to-date, it was about 13%. So, I think that where we have continued high expectations that online will help drive enrollments as well as improve customer experience. The ASPs for online courses are lower as I mentioned. So the contribution to revenues we expect to continue to be lower than the enrollment contribution.
Ella Ji
好的,谢谢。最后一个问题是关于你们2016财年的业务扩张策略。去年你们进行了一些小规模收购。能否谈谈今年的计划?你们打算进行更多收购,还是计划专注于现有业务,帮助这些公司发展壮大?
Ella Ji
Okay, thanks. And the last question is regarding your business expansion strategy for this FY ‘16 so you made some acquisitions, small size acquisitions last year. Can you talk about what’s your planning for this year? And are you going to make more acquisitions or do you plan to just focus on the existing ones and just help those companies grow bigger and better?
Joseph Kaufman
是的。在收购或战略投资方面,我们将保持机会主义态度。实际上你们会看到我们更多地进行战略投资,即持有少数股权而非完全收购。我认为我们将继续更加专注于互联网、移动以及技术与教育的交叉领域。去年我们没有进行中心式收购,我认为这一趋势可能会延续到下一年。
Joseph Kaufman
Yes. We will be opportunistic in terms of acquisitions or strategic investments. You actually see us do a lot more in the strategic investment time taking minority stakes other than full acquisitions. I think we will continue to be focused more on internet, mobile and that intersection of technology with education. We haven’t done kind of center-based acquisitions in the last year and I think that will probably continue to be the trend going into the next year.
Ella Ji
明白了。非常感谢。
Ella Ji
Got it. Thank you so much.
Joseph Kaufman
谢谢,Ella。
Joseph Kaufman
Thanks, Ella.
Operator
下一个问题来自摩根大通的(听不清)。请提问。
Operator
Your next question comes from the line of (indiscernible) from JPMorgan. Please ask your question.
Unidentified Analyst
是的,你好,我是(Lyon)。业绩表现不错。我有个快速的问题:你们在过去两个季度的EBIT利润率大幅提升,问题是你们是如何做到的?谢谢。
Unidentified Analyst
Yes, hey, hi, it’s (Lyon). Nicely done on the results. I just have a quick question like you have this massive improvement in your EBIT margin basically in the last two quarters, right, the question is just how did you do that? Thanks.
Joseph Kaufman
是的,当然。关于息税前利润率,我认为其他分析师已经提到,我们在下半年面临较低的同比基数。我想部分原因是通过强劲的招生和收入增长,我们能够在销售、一般及行政费用方面实现规模效应,同时通过平衡现有设施的利用率和新增设施,我们能够提升毛利率,并且我们在过去一年中包括北京在内的某些市场实施了提价。展望未来,我们不提供更紧迫的指引,但基于预算,我预计非公认会计准则下大约有250个基点的压缩。第四季度我提到了春节影响,因此很可能会有几百个基点的利润率波动——在某一年是顺风,在下一年就会成为逆风。所以过去一年,如果你谈论下半年我们如何实现,很大程度上是执行力,但我们也确实有一些不错的顺风,主要是春节时间安排,这帮助了我们去年的第二季度和第四季度,而今年我们将不会有这种优势。但如果剔除这一影响,我们将努力保持持平,或者非公认会计准则下最多压缩100个基点。如果我们没有投资于在线业务、ICS 3.0、O2O和其他后端系统等各种业务,除了春节带来的利润率波动外,我们很可能根本不会看到下降。但我们认为这些投资对于公司的长期增长是有意义的,正如我提到的,其他分析师询问在线业务,我们不认为这会扰乱K-12业务,而是将其视为一个巨大机遇。所以除了回答你关于我们下半年表现的问题外,我还想稍微提一下我们对明年的思考。
Joseph Kaufman
Yes, sure. In terms of the EBIT margin, I mean, I think that other analysts have talked about the fact that we were cycling a lower quarter in the second half of the year. So I mean I think part of it was through strong enrollment and revenue growth we are able to scale on the SG&A side and then by focusing on the balance between utilization of existing facilities and adding new facilities we were able to drive gross margin and we also took a price increase in certain markets over the last year including Beijing. On a going forward basis we don’t provide more urgent guidance but based on budget I could see approximately 250 basis points of compression on a non-GAAP basis. Q4 I mentioned the Chinese New Year impact, so there is likely to be a swing of a couple of 100 basis points of margin windfall in one year that would be headwind in the next year. So this past year if you talk about the second half of the year and how we did it a lot of it was execution but we did have some nice headwind just in terms of the timing of Chinese New Year that helps us in Q2 and Q4 of last year which we won’t have in this year. But I you take out that impact then we’re going to try to keep it flat to maybe 100 basis points of compression on a non-GAAP basis. If we weren’t investing in various businesses like online, ICS 3.0, O2O and other backend systems we wouldn’t likely see a decline at all except to the fluctuation margins given to the Chinese New Year. But we think these makes sense for the long-term growth of the company as I mentioned would be other analysts that we’re asking about online, we don’t see this is disrupting K-12 but we see it as a big opportunity. So I just wanted to – in addition to answering your questions about how we did in the second half of the year also give a bit of a heads-up about how we’re thinking about it for next year.
Unidentified Analyst
只是一个快速跟进问题,我不想问明年的事情,只是想了解——你们如何——当你们为全年应用一般及行政费用和销售费用时,是像按季度进行,还是在整个财年一次性处理?如果像今年后期那样销售出现意外增长,你们是否完全不会调整费用,就像年度预算那样?这就是我的问题。
Unidentified Analyst
Just a quick follow-up I don’t want to ask about next year but just by – how do you – when you’re applying your G&A and your selling expense for the entire year like do you do it like a quarter at a time or just you do it in the whole fiscal year and if you had a surprise increase in sales and like for the last part of the year then you basically don’t change the expense at all like an annual budget like that, that’s the question?
Joseph Kaufman
是的,我们确实有年度预算。我们每年9月开始预算编制流程,首先按业务部门制定工作计划,然后将这些计划与预算挂钩,最终与系统中每个人的绩效KPI相关联。因此,我们拥有一个相当完整的年度预算体系,通常每年3月完成编制,次年4月由董事会批准。所以我们会继续按季度审视情况,当我们发现某些方面超出预算时,如果我们认为有更多投资机会——比如我提到的ICS 3.0互动课堂平板项目——如果我们实现了非常强劲的营收增长,我们可能决定在北京先行试点,如果获得良好的消费者反馈,就可能更广泛地推广,因为这实际上是在投资我们的未来增长。这就是我们的思考方式,是的。
Joseph Kaufman
Yes, we do have an annual budget. We started our budgeting process in September of each year by establishing a work plan by department by business unit and then if we tie that to our budget which is eventually tied to performance KPIs for everybody in the system. So we have a pretty integrated annual budget system that usually ends in March every year and is approved by the board in April the following year. So we will continue to look at things quarter-by-quarter and as we do see that we’re achieving over budget in some cases if we believe that there are opportunities to invest more like I mentioned ICS 3.0 that interactive classroom pad thing. That we could just do it in Beijing if we were achieving very strong top-line we may decide that it makes sense to roll that out more broadly especially if we get great consumer feedback about it because then we’re really investing in our future growth. So that’s the way we think about it, yes.
Unidentified Analyst
好的,明白了。谢谢。
Unidentified Analyst
Okay, alright. Thanks.
Operator
非常感谢。目前电话中没有更多问题了。现在我将把会议交还给今天的主持人Joseph Kaufman先生。请继续。
Operator
Thank you very much. There are no further questions in the phone at this time. I will now like to hand the call back to your presenter for today Mr. Joseph Kaufman. Please continue.
Joseph Kaufman
谢谢。感谢大家今晚抽出时间参加我们的会议。我们期待继续与各位保持沟通。如果各位有任何问题或希望安排时间来北京参观,请联系我、梅女士或我们的任何投资者关系人员。非常感谢,祝大家有美好的一天。
Joseph Kaufman
Thank you. Thank you all for taking the time to be with us tonight. We look forward to continuing to have communication with you. If you guys should have any questions or like to arrange the time to come to Beijing please reach out to myself, to Mei or to any of our IR personnel. Thanks so much and have a good day.