Dugong AI Secures Tens of Millions in Series A Funding Led by Guangzhou Health Investment to Advance Weak Magnetic Field Technology for Sleep Apnea Screening

Major Good News! Recently, Guangzhou DuGong AI Health Technology Co., Ltd. (Dugong AI, hereinafter referred to as "DuGong AI") officially announced the completion of its Series A financing round, amounting to tens of millions of RMB. This round was led by Guangzhou Health Industry Investment Private Equity Fund Management Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Guangzhou Health Industry Investment Fund"), a subsidiary of Guangzhou Financial Holdings Group.Shangji Zhuanhua serves asCapital Advisor. As a key project for the commercialization of achievements from Guangdong Provincial Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, this financing will inject strong momentum into the market promotion of the company’s core products and the diversification of its pipeline, accelerating the adoption of weak magnetic medical technology to benefit more patients.

It is reported that Dugong AI is a deeply incubated project of Shangji Transformation (Guangzhou) Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “Shangji Transformation”), which has provided support in areas such as capital planning and financing guidance.

Dugong AI, established in April 2018 and headquartered in Huangpu District, Guangzhou, is a medical-engineering integration innovation enterprise incubated by leveraging the clinical resources and technological expertise of Guangdong Provincial Hospital of Chinese Medicine. The company’s core team comprises senior experts from prestigious institutions such as Guangdong Provincial Hospital of Chinese Medicine and Beihang University, with an academician serving as the academic leader. Adhering to the development philosophy of “clinical needs driving technological innovation, and technological innovation serving clinical applications,” Dugong AI has successfully integrated the hospital’s clinical experience in sleep health and chronic disease prevention and control with cutting-edge engineering technologies, achieving breakthroughs and commercialization in multiple core technologies. Currently, the company holds three granted invention patents, ten pending invention patent applications, and eighteen granted utility model patents and software copyrights, establishing a robust intellectual property barrier.

Partial Intellectual Property Rights of Dugong AI

The key milestone of this financing round coincides with the company'sCore Product — The non-invasive magnetic induction-based sleep apnea risk screener for humans has obtained the Class II Medical Device Registration Certificate (Yue Xie Zhu Zhun 20252071582). This product is the first Class II certification in China for auxiliary diagnosis of Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA) and represents one of the landmark achievements in the commercialization of research outcomes from Guangdong Provincial Hospital of Chinese Medicine.To address the pain points in clinical OSA diagnosis, such as the high subjectivity of scale assessments, stringent site requirements for polysomnography (PSG), prolonged testing cycles, and poor patient compliance, this product employs core open weak magnetic measurement technology. It non-invasively detects weak magnetic signals from the human head using electromagnetic induction coil sensors and combines them with AI algorithms to accurately assess sleep status, completing the test in just 10 minutes. With a footprint of only 6 m² and a daily capacity of over 30 patients, the product significantly lowers the threshold for clinical testing and enhances diagnostic and therapeutic efficiency, perfectly meeting the urgent market demand for convenient and efficient equipment in sleep diagnosis and treatment.

Non-invasive Human Magnetic Induction Sleep Apnea Risk Screening Device

With the state’s increasing emphasis on sleep health, it has become a public health issue of nationwide concern. The “2025 China Sleep Health Survey Report,” released by the Chinese Sleep Research Society, shows that 48.5% of individuals aged 18 and above in China experience sleep disturbances, with over 300 million people suffering from sleep disorders. Among these, obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), a common chronic sleep-related breathing disorder, causes recurrent oxygen deprivation during sleep due to airway obstruction. Long-term neglect not only impairs sleep quality but also significantly increases the risks of depression and dementia, as well as cardiovascular mortality, posing a serious threat to human health.

Currently, the clinical diagnosis of obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) primarily relies on questionnaires and polysomnography (PSG). However, questionnaire-based assessments are highly subjective, while PSG is limited by stringent facility requirements, prolonged testing duration, poor patient compliance, and high costs for both patients and hospital procurement. With the state’s increasing emphasis on sleep health, Lei Haichao, Director of the National Health Commission, explicitly stated in September 2025 that it is expected that by the end of 2025, at least one hospital in 97% of prefecture-level cities across China will offer sleep clinic services. The sleep diagnosis and treatment market is entering a period of rapid development, creating an urgent demand for more convenient and efficient diagnostic equipment.

Dugong AI’s OSA screener fills a market gap with its core advantages of being non-invasive, rapid, accurate, and convenient. It can be widely applied in scenarios such as hospital sleep clinics, health examination centers, and community health service centers, providing strong support for early disease screening and health management, and helping to alleviate the nationwide crisis of suboptimal health.

Furthermore, Dugong AI is actively expanding into diverse fields such as magnetocardiography (MCG), Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), and general health and wellness, leveraging its core open weak magnetic measurement technology. The company continues to enrich its portfolio of intelligent medical devices, providing multidimensional solutions for early clinical detection, auxiliary diagnosis, and health risk assessment. In the field of MCG, it has developed a prototype magnetocardiograph; in TCM, it is collaborating with the Hengqin Laboratory to conduct research on human magnetic induction-based TCM syndromes (deficiency and excess); and in the general health and wellness sector, its independently developed intelligent health screening system has been officially launched in the market, offering health screening services to insurance companies, banks, airlines, elderly care institutions, and other entities through partner organizations.

Dugong AI Team stated:This round of financing was led by Guangzhou Health Industry Investment, marking both a strong endorsement from the capital market of the company’s technological prowess, product potential, and the value of translating research achievements from Guangdong Provincial Hospital of Chinese Medicine into practical applications, as well as a significant milestone in the company’s development. Moving forward, Dugong AI will continue to deepen its expertise in the field of weak-magnetic medicine, guided by clinical needs, to steadily drive technological innovation and product iteration, expand into more clinical application scenarios, and ensure that innovative medical devices benefit a broader patient population. In doing so, the company aims to contribute more “Chinese solutions” to early detection, auxiliary diagnosis, and health risk assessment in global clinical healthcare.

Nie Huiming, Head of Investment at Guangzhou Health Industry Investment, stated:Protecting people’s lives and health is a major national strategic priority. As a strategically emerging industry encouraged by the state, high-end medical devices urgently require breakthroughs in innovative technologies and equipment. Dugong AI’s original technological advantages in weak-magnetism medicine align closely with national strategic needs, particularly given its background in translating research achievements from the Provincial Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine. We are optimistic about the team’s first-mover advantage in sleep monitoring and look forward to the company growing into a specialized, refined, distinctive, and innovative enterprise with international influence.

Shangji Zhuanhua stated:We remain long-term bullish on the potential of Dugong AI’s weak magnetic measurement technology to be deployed in scenarios such as disease prevention and control, as well as health management. The recent product approval and successful financing round represent a landmark achievement for Shangji Transformation, a service platform dedicated to the commercialization of biomedical scientific and technological achievements, in deeply incubating its portfolio companies. They also underscore the capital market’s strong confidence in domestically developed, original medical devices. Looking ahead, we will leverage the dual empowerment of capital and technology to help the company further expand its market advantages, seize first-mover opportunities in global competition, grow into a leading enterprise in the field of weak magnetic technology, and achieve a closed-loop transformation of scientific and technological achievements from the laboratory to the market.