Benesse
Learning platform and service experience for Japan's largest education brand.
What new opportunities and concerns emerge when traditional early childhood education is combined with AI?
We applied AI to age-specific, real-time learning interactions and parent participation, while carefully addressing privacy and screen-time control.
Explored and designed experience strategy and creative direction for Benesse China's digital education transformation, translating parent and child insights into a scalable membership ecosystem across app, curriculum, product, service, and sales communication. The work connected consumer research, product positioning, interaction design, and launch validation for a culturally localized APAC market.
Challenge
A heritage Japanese education brand needed to regain relevance with millennial parents in China by exploring how AI technology could enhance curriculum design while creating a learning experience families could trust. The challenge was to reposition the value proposition, reduce parent anxiety, engage children through meaningful digital learning, and translate deep user research into actionable product and communication strategy.
Solution
The team created an end-to-end Qiaohu learning experience system, from purchase decision and onboarding to daily use and parent-child interaction. We integrated digital curriculum, printed workbooks, learning toys, parent-assistant features, and community support into a coherent service journey, ensuring each touchpoint made learning effective, engaging, and trustworthy. For next-generation parents, we also framed how AI-enabled curriculum features should address privacy, safety, and family trust.
Impact
We helped Benesse increase its subscription rate by 10% after the new curriculum launched, while embedding a more user-centered design-thinking methodology inside the organization. Beyond the product outcome, the project gave Benesse a faster decision-making model for sales communication, curriculum design, prototype testing, and listening to consumer feedback — helping the group innovate more quickly across learning products, parent services, and brand experience.
About
Benesse
Benesse’s Chinese Kodomo Challenge business served 1.12 million children as of April 2021, making China its largest overseas education market. The company has continued localizing family learning while responding to digital competition through integrated content, services, and learning experiences designed around Chinese parents and preschool children.