Yaoyanshe Announced its Series C Round of Funding of CNY 300 Million

Yaoyanshe(药研社) recently announced its Series C round of funding of CNY 300 million (USD 42.62 million). Eastern Bell Capital (钟鼎资本) and Sequoia China(红杉中国) led the investment, followed by Matrix Partners China (经纬中国), Vision Plus Capital (元璟资本) and Genesis Capital (元生资本). 

This round of financing is used for developing technology product, building a supply chain, improving client experience and constructing a talent platform.   

Yaoyanshe provides new types of CRO (contract research organization) and CMO (contract manufacturing organization) services, ranging from drug development through drug manufacturing in the pharmaceutical industry outsourced on a contract basis. 

As an internet platform, Yaoyanshe emphasizes the importance of data and talents. This April, Yaoyanshe launched a clinic research entrance platform Trial.Link that connects drug enterprises, hospitals, researchers, industry practitioners and patients. 

Leveraging data technology, it helps pharmaceutical enterprises to achieve high efficiency and standardization with lower cost during clinical experiments. So far, it has attracted more than 180 hospitals and 300 drug manufacturers to its platform. It is reported that the platform has shortened the development period by 20% and lowered development cost by 15%.

Drug development is a cash-burning, time-consuming process involving multiparty cooperation. Thanks to policy encouragement, a host of drug development start-ups have flourished. Smaller drug developers are especially reliant on CRO services. 

Xiong Fei, Partner at Matrix Partners China, has said that medical research outsourcing is worth CNY 50 billion with an annual growth rate of around 20%.