Ting Ting Group (Dingxiangyuan — DXY), one of China’s largest online healthcare service communities that claimed more than 4 million registered members in China and other countries, will receive a strategic investment of US$70 million from Tencent (HK:00700) in exchange for a minority equity stake in DXY on a fully diluted and as converted basis.
Following the closing of this investment, DXY will work with Tencent on a series of initiatives to bring its services to Tencent’s various platforms, including exploring possible services to integrate into WeChat and Mobile QQ, citing the press release. Started as a pharmacopoeia and providing services to doctors and healthcare companies, DXY has been investing in and exploring opportunities related to consumer healthcare since last year, with its products such as the Family Medicine App and DXY Doctor amassing millions of users.
DXY plans to invest the capital received from this investment and other resources into developing healthcare products for doctors, pharmaceutical companies, and consumers. Looking ahead, DXY will launch products in three categories — WeChat-based products, mobile apps, and Web-based products. Moreover, the fund will be used to construct a platform for private practice doctors, allowing more doctors to practice individually or in small group offices rather than concentrating medical resources in big hospitals. DXY also plans to experiment with O2O services, providing doctors in China with a platform and resources to carry out their medical practice on the go thereby fully unlocking the value of their expertise. There will also be O2O services aimed at patients that offer patients a better user experience.
Previously, DXY completed two rounds of investments from DCM and Shunwei China Internet Fund. Following this round of investment, DXY’s founding management team will continue to have a majority stake in DXY and have a majority in its board of directors. David Feng, Vice President of DXY and Richard Peng, Vice President of Tencent, will become DXY’s board members.
With the fast approaching of aging society and government supports, Chinese healthcare industry receiving more attentions from the public. Tencent’s arch-rival Alibaba Group has made early inroads into this sector with a series of moves like acquisition of CITIC 21CN to control drug-data, launching drug authenticity plan, future hospital plan, and supporting Alipay Wallet mobile payment in Pharmacies, etc. Mobile health app Chunyu just landed a landmark US$50 million series C round earlier this month. Internet health platform Kanchufang has received million-dollar level investment. Other startups engaged in this industry are mobile pharmaceutical platform Zhaoniya,and healthcare social platform The CareVoice. image credit: DXY
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