High-Quality Development of China’s Private Higher Education Institutions from the Perspective of Business Model Innovation

PBES

Proceedings of Business and Economic Studies

2209-26412209-265X

Bio-Byword Scientific Publishing Pty. Ltd.

10.26689/PBES.v9i9.15657

Article

High-Quality Development of China’s Private Higher Education Institutions from the Perspective of Business Model Innovationhttps://artdesignp.com/journal/PBES/9/9/10.26689/PBES.v9i9.15657WangXiaobin

2026

2026-09-30

China’s private higher education institutions (PHEIs) have moved from expansion into consolidation. Their difficulties are usually analyzed through pedagogy, governance, or educational finance, leaving unexamined the commercial architecture that determines whether a self-funded campus remains solvent. This article applies the Wei-Zhu framework, which defines a business model as the transaction structure among stakeholders and decomposes it into six elements. Drawing on thirty-one interviews and documentary analysis across ten PHEIs in Wuhan during 2025, it reconstructs and compares each case. Four weaknesses recur: imitative positioning, a business system that treats employers as recipients, a profit model dependent on tuition alone, and a cash-flow structure mismatched to the investment cycle. Three pathways follow, concerning transaction subjects, modes, and pricing.Private higher education institutions, Business model innovation, Wei-Zhu six-element model, High-quality development

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