EqualOcean (EO) Podcasts

Sunshine Insurance Plans to List on HKSE: Total Premium Income of CNY 62.9 Bn in H1 2022

Hello from EqualOcean. I am your host Jason Poon, and the sector I will be covering today is the financial sector.  Sunshine Insurance Group (Chinese: 阳光保险集团) has recently passed the listing decision of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. According to the post-decision information, the joint sponsors of the company are Huatai Securities (Chinese: 华泰国际)、CICC (Chinese: 中金公司)、UBS (Chinese: 瑞银集团) and CCBI (Chinese: 建银国际). The funds raised will be used to strengthen the company's capital base to support the continued growth of the business. Sunshine Insurance is a Chinese private insurance services group, operating life and health insurance through Sunshine Life, property and casualty insurance through Sunshine Property and Casualty, and managing funds through Sunshine Capital Management. Sunshine Insurance may become the tenth listed insurance company in China. In terms of operating results, Sunshine Insurance's total premium income showed an overall growth trend, but net profit declined in the first half and first three quarters of 2022. From 2019 to 2021, the company achieved a total premium income of CNY 87.91 billion, CNY 92.57 billion and CNY 101.76 billion, respectively. The total premium income in the first half of 2022 was CNY 62.95 billion, an increase of 14.31% compared with the same period of the previous year. The Five famous insurance companies in China include China Life Insurance Company Limited (Chinese: 中国人寿, China Life, 601628:SH), Ping An Insurance (Group) Company of China, Ltd. (Chinese: 中国平安, PingAn, 601318: SH), The People's Insurance Company (Group) of China Limited (Chinese: 中国人保, PICC, 601319:SH), China Pacific Insurance (Group) Co., Ltd. (Chinese: 中国太保, CPIC, 601601:SH), and New China Life Insurance Company Ltd.(Chinese:新华保险, NCI, 601336:SH). Please follow us on our Chinese and English websites, cn.equalocean.com and equalocean.com, to learn more about our business

B2B Intelligent Marketing Firm Bailian Raises CNY 100 Mn in Pre-B Series Funding Round

Hello from EqualOcean, I am your host Jason Poon, and the sector I will be covering today is the consumer sector.  The Chinese B2B intelligent marketing company Bailian.AI (Chinese: 百炼智能) raised CNY 100 million (USD 13.8 million) from Pre-B series funding round on 7 November, 2022. The financing was led by Enlight Growth Partners (Chinese: 明裕创投) and Fore Bright Capital (Chinese: 光远投资), followed by DeTong Capital (Chinese: 德同资本), and continued to be increased by the previous shareholders Orient Capital (Chinese: 东方嘉富) and Yunqi Partners (Chinese: 云启资本). The funds will be used to strengthen the marketing, develop products, improve the B2B marketing product matrix and the competitive barrier of AI technology. Bailian.AI is a Chinese B2B intelligent marketing service provider, founded in 2018, providing data-driven intelligent marketing SaaS products as well as digital solutions for companies with B2B marketing needs. It is focused on helping companies improve their marketing efficiency from market insights to sales lead development, screening, contacting and conversion through AI technology. Feng Shicong, the founder and CEO of Bailian.AI, said that the company's objective is to become a unicorn in the B2B intelligent marketing industry and to become ZoomInfo in China. In terms of business model, Bailian.AI chooses to serve medium and large enterprises with more purchasing power and innovation. At the industry level, the company has now covered a wide range of fields such as technology, energy, fast-moving consumer goods, finance and production, and has now achieved significant growth in business revenue scale for many consecutive years, serving a total of over 300 medium and large companies. Please follow us on our Chinese and English websites cn.equalocean.com and equalocean.com to learn more about our business

Biotech Rgenta Wins USD 52 Mn in Series A Funding Round

The precise regulation of RNA target sites is expected to regulate protein expression from upstream, intervene in traditionally undruggable targets, and control diseases. Rgenta Therapeutics, an innovative drug developer, announced its completion of a Series A round of financing worth USD 52 million. This funding round was led by AstraZeneca CICC Medical Industry Venture Fund (Chinese: 阿斯利康中金医疗产业基金), with participation from Korea Investment Partners, Delos Capital and the existing investors. The funds raised in this round will accelerate the construction of the R&D platforms for RNA-targeting small-molecule novel RNA drugs and the development of the pipelines. Founded in 2018, Rgenta is a biotechnology company that focuses on developing RNA-targeting medicines for historically undruggable targets to meet unmet clinical needs. The company closed a Seed round of financing worth USD 20 million in 2020. The investors were Boehringer Ingelheim Venture Fund, Matrix Partners China (Chinese: 经纬创投), Lilly Asia Ventures (Chinese: 礼来亚洲基金), Kaitai Capital (Chinese: 凯泰资本) and Legend Star Fund (Chinese: 联想之星). The development of small-molecule drugs usually targets proteins. However, only a quarter of the proteins implicated in human diseases are currently druggable by traditional approaches for developing small-molecule compounds. Exploring novel methods directly targeting RNA opens up unprecedented opportunities for drug development. Due to the structural characteristics of RNA and the complexity of related regulatory mechanisms, the development of small-molecule RNA-targeting medicines has a high threshold. Rgenta has built a proprietary platform that mines the massive genomics data to identify high-efficacy and high-specificity RNA target sites, and design small-molecule glues to modulate the interactions among the spliceosome, regulatory proteins, and RNAs. Currently, the company is developing a pipeline of oral, small-molecule RNA-targeting medicines with an initial focus on oncology and neurological disorders. Relevant Chinese enterprises include Stemirna Therapeutics (Chinese: 斯微生物), Innorna (Chinese: 深信生物) and Ribo (Chinese: 瑞博生物).

Geely-Backed Automaker ZEEKR Unveiled its First Driverless Concept Vehicle ZEEKR M-Vision

Welcome to EqualOcean News, bringing to you the most up-to-date news. ZEEKR, a Geely-backed automaker, unveiled the ZEEKR M-Vision concept vehicle built on ZEEKR's smart mobility platform, the SEA-M architecture, with expected mass production ready by 2024. On November 17, Geely's electric vehicle brand ZEEKR (Chinese: 极氪汽车) officially unveiled ZEEKR M-Vision, the first driverless concept vehicle developed by the company. Meanwhile, ZEEKR also announced its unmanned electric vehicles' presence in Los Angeles, co-developed with the well-known global autonomous vehicle company Waymo. The SEA-M platform used in ZEEKR M-Vision possesses a wheelbase falling between 2,700 mm and 3,300 mm, indicating a huge span and opening up possibilities for flexible seating arrangements from a luxury two-seat configuration all the way to a 9-seat commuter shuttle. Founded in March 2021, ZEEKR is a premium EV brand of Geely Group (Chinese: 吉利集团), committed to being a user-driven tech company and satisfying global demand for premium electric vehicles. ZEEKR successfully bagged USD 500 million through its pre-series A funding in August 2021, led by Intel Capital and followed by CATL (Chinese: 宁德时代), Cathay Fortune Corporation (Chinese: 鸿商集团), Bilibili (Chinese: 哔哩哔哩) and Boyu Capital (Chinese: 博裕资本). The ZEEKR M-Vision is expected to be ready for series production in 2024. The model will be used exclusively in the American Waymo fleet, not only in the unmanned version but also in the driver-controlled version. Andy An, CEO of ZEEKR, claimed that the unveiling of ZEEKR M-Vision has shown the brand's technological strengths and business potential. He stated that ZEEKR's R&D team is capable of providing customized services for clients worldwide, along with support from ZEEKR's global partners.

Self-Driving Sanitation Solutions Provider Yunchuang Zhixing Received Financing from Baidu

Hello from EqualOcean, I am your host Jason Poon, and the sector I will be covering today is the automotive sector.  On November 24, autonomous driving sanitation solutions provider Yunchuang Zhixing (Chinese: 云创智行) completed its pre-A+ round of financing, which was exclusively invested by Baidu Venture (Chinese: 百度风投). The fund will be used for product R&D and market expansion, promoting the application of autonomous driving sanitation vehicles. Yunchuang Zhixing, founded in March 2021 and based in Suzhou, is an innovative high-tech enterprise focusing on researching, producing, selling, and operating self-driving sanitation vehicles. The company's founder, Bai Yunlong, is a Doctor of Engineering who graduated from Tsinghua University and used to be a director of FULONGMA (Chinese: 福龙马), a large sanitation enterprise listed in Shanghai Security Exchange. The firm has developed self-driving sanitation sweepers, including YC200 and YC800. It is reported that after technology iteration, the sweeper, YC800, can be applicated in open scenarios, such as municipal roads, and will be ready for mass production by December. Yunchuang Zhxing also established a factory in Suzhou to increase the company's mass production capacity to satisfy the demand. In the future, Yunchuang Zhixing will continue to increase investment in product R&D and acquire more head customers, promoting the development of autonomous driving sanitation. Please follow us on our Chinese and English websites cn.equalocean.com and equalocean.com to learn more about our business