As a big data engineer based in Beijing, Li Kun got into telecommuting as early as 2013, but he said that today, during the novel coronavirus outbreak, he has seen its promotion grow like never before. 

"Telecommuting may become a new trend in some industries, such as technological research and development, where offline communication is not always needed, which can greatly lower costs," Li told Beijing Review. 

To reduce face-to-face contact and prevent the spread of the epidemic, China has promoted telecommuting and online education among office workers and students alike through emerging Internet platforms.  

Data from DingTalk, a mobile office tool developed by China’s Internet giant Alibaba, showed that nearly 200 million people across the county started working online on February 3, the first work day after the Spring Festival holiday. 

To support work at home, tech giants such as Tencent and ByteDance are also offering telecommuting and teleconferencing products to the public free of charge. According to WeChat Work developed by Tencent, millions of domestic enterprises had used the app by 6 p.m. on February 3, three times the number of users for the corresponding period last year. 

Telecommuting, as a flexible way of working, can offer more choices to domestic enterprises, Wang Qiong, an industrial director of WeChat Work, told Shanghai Securities News. 

Since China's Ministry of Education announced that the 2020 spring semester for schools will be postponed due to the epidemic, many schools have joined the trend of online education by turning to TV stations or online platforms, where students can communicate with teachers in real time.  

Technology and education enterprises have also seized the opportunity to expand their consumer base. DingTalk launched live streaming courses which has attracted 12 million students in 20,000 schools nationwide by February 2.  

However, problems such live-streaming network lag remain to be addressed, according to many users. 

"The consumer group of remote work may shrink once the epidemic and free services end, but domestic enterprises will be able to make quick progress from user feedback and begin to explore a larger market," Yuan Wenhui, CEO of Xiaoyu Yilian, a China-based intelligent cloud platform, told National Business Daily. 

Copyedited by Rebeca Toledo 

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