-'Live Class', growing into a D2C model where knowledge creators directly manage customers… 13 consecutive quarters of transaction volume growth
-“People are the product”… Helping knowledge creators build their personal brand
– “Education should lead to change and growth of learners, not simply the delivery of lecture content.”
“ Education is not a commodity ”
CEO Shin Cheol-heon, whom we met at the Future School office located in Heyground, Seongsu-dong, said this when asked about the background and mission of the company. CEO Shin pointed out that education companies think they have fulfilled their responsibility by focusing on and delivering educational content, but that this is the wrong approach.
CEO Shin started a business in 2009 and successfully exited. Like many ‘successful entrepreneurs,’ CEO Shin also pondered how to live his life going forward. “The question I asked myself then was whether to conform to reality or to pursue a dream.” CEO Shin chose to pursue a life of dreaming and began a new career at an education company in 2011.
“I saw many people who were deeply moved and determined to change right after receiving the training. I thought we were on the right track and felt rewarded by the training. But the problem is that when I contacted them for phone coaching a few days later, most of them forgot the inspiration and determination they had felt at that time and started living their busy daily lives.”
Mr. Shin believed that the industry needed to be redefined. “I thought that we should not just deliver, but help people experience real change. I thought that was the essence of education.”
I thought that what was important in education was not the delivery of the product, but the resulting change in the customer, and this idea became the philosophical foundation of Future School, which I would later found.
“ Anyone should be able to learn anytime, anywhere”
With this in mind, CEO Shin created and operated the predecessor of 'LiveKlass'. However, offline education had its limitations. One day, a student asked, "Can you do it one more time?" and he decided to establish Future School.
“Education that is easily accessible in Seoul is difficult to access in some areas. Offline education has limitations in time and space. That’s why I thought online education was necessary. I thought that if it could be a two-way education where students can learn while interacting like offline education, online education could also lead to change and growth for students.”
CEO Shin left the education company and took on another challenge. He founded Future School in 2018 with the mission of “creating a platform that helps people grow through knowledge and creating a world where people’s places of residence do not limit their opportunities to learn.”
“ Knowledge makes people grow and change ”
Mr. Shin explained that 'knowledge' is a broader concept than 'education'. For example, for a job seeker preparing for a developer job, advice from a junior developer with 3 years of experience is more helpful than advice from a CTO with 20 years of experience. An experienced CTO with 20 years of experience can provide education better, but a junior developer with 3 years of experience can provide the content that job seekers actually need better. In other words, knowledge can be said to be a concept that focuses more on 'changes in demand'.
That is why Future School focuses on how students change and grow due to content rather than the content itself or the content delivery. In order to bring about change and growth in learners, continuous relationships, not one-time transactions, must be the premise. This is because the learner's growth can be supported in a continuous relationship. In order to bring about change and growth in learners, content must be tailored to the individual's situation and goals, not uniform content. And responsibility must be taken for the learner's changes after the content delivery.
■ Application of direct sales (D2C) model
“ Personal brand is the core value ”
This philosophy of Future School led to the business model of Live Class. To explain the business of Live Class, CEO Shin started by explaining the difference between physical products and knowledge content. Since physical products are the same, it doesn’t matter where you buy them. That’s why price is the most important. On the other hand, there are no identical products for knowledge content. That’s why you can’t buy them anywhere. People are important, and people are the products. This means that the personal brand of the creator (knowledge conveyer) becomes the core value of the product. This is why Future School provides professional support for the personal branding of creators.
“You need to understand the essential difference between physical products and knowledge content. If a cup is broken, you don’t have to buy it from the same shopping mall the next time. You can compare prices and buy it from the cheapest place. That’s why physical products have price hegemony. On the other hand, knowledge businesses are different. If you take a lecture on AI or financial technology, you don’t learn from just anyone. That’s why people are products in knowledge businesses, and personal brands are important. Even if there are many related lectures, you have no choice but to find someone who has a personal brand.”
“ Creators must communicate directly with customers ”
The second difference between physical products and knowledge content is in the relationship with the customer. While physical products are important before establishing a relationship with the customer, that is, the process of informing the customer about the product, setting the price, marketing, and delivering it, knowledge content becomes important from the moment the customer makes a payment.
“Physical products are finished once purchased, but knowledge content is important after purchase. If you don’t watch the content for a week after purchase, you will be asked to refund. That’s why the experience of the student after purchasing the knowledge content is important. It is important to track how far they have watched, whether they have completed their assignments, etc., so that they can experience the knowledge content.”
The biggest difference of LiveClass is that it allows creators to directly own and manage customer information, allowing them to build lasting relationships with customers. Creators can obtain information such as buyer contact information, learning progress, and participation, and use it for follow-up marketing and product development.
■ Focus solely on content creation through operational automation
Future School reflects the characteristics of this knowledge business by providing a system that allows creators to effectively sell their knowledge and manage students. With this system, creators can focus solely on content creation.
- Build your own website and brand: Creators can quickly and easily build their own independent website through LiveClass. The site is designed to reflect the creator's brand identity and can use their own domain.
- Freedom of knowledge product composition: Creators can freely combine various forms of content such as VOD, live lectures, e-books, assignments, and communities to create their own unique knowledge products.
- Automation of Operational Management: We provide an LMS (Learning Management System) that automates operational management, including tracking students' learning progress, monitoring participation, and automatic notifications.
- Marketing Automation: Create automated marketing scenarios based on customer behavior, such as PDF downloads, email reception, and video viewing, allowing creators to efficiently manage customer funnels.
■ Growth of the knowledge business market
There are many knowledge creators who help live classes change and grow, such as topper designers who write on cakes, creators who teach items and provide design files and know-how to workshops run by mothers across the country, current doctors who teach marketing methods for hospitals and clinics, creators who teach eyebrow tattoos, creators who give special lectures for the teacher certification exam at the end of the year, creators who lecture on second life consulting for those in their 40s and 50s, creators who lecture on exercise methods run by former members of the Steel Unit UDT, and creators who teach chess.
“With the advent of AI, quality jobs are decreasing and polarization is occurring. People want to create additional income in addition to their primary income. Labor has an upper limit to the income that can be earned, and capital can only be participated in by those who have capital. On the other hand, knowledge can be participated in by anyone.”
CEO Shin predicted that the knowledge platform economy will become increasingly widespread. “AI will lower the barrier to entry, allowing anyone to participate. It is also important to help buyers make real changes, not just simply transfer knowledge. Even if AI gives you the answer, if you don’t act on it, your life won’t change. Helping people move and change requires people to lead with affection,” he explained the important elements of the knowledge platform economy.
■ The secret to 13 consecutive quarters of transaction volume growth
Future School achieved 34x growth in the first quarter of 2025 compared to the first quarter of 2022 with 13 consecutive quarters of transaction growth. It is achieving results of 9.7 million cumulative creator-users, KRW 47 billion in cumulative revenue, and 700,000 MAU.
Regarding the reason for such achievements, CEO Shin explained that it is the result of 'Jultaksimultaneity' where 'market growth (Juul)' and 'creators' efforts (Tak)' meet. He also cited a genuine and capable team that shares the mission and vision as the secret to 13 consecutive quarters of transaction growth.
Futureschole aims to reach BEP (break-even point) in 2025 and is preparing for KOSDAQ listing in 2028. It is also exploring global expansion. Recently, it has also recruited a CTO from Coupang to develop business automation, marketing automation, operational automation, and customer management system utilizing AI.
Attention is being paid to whether Future School will lead the future of knowledge business and become Asia's number one knowledge business platform.
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