Interview with Yan Guowei, Founder of Qingyun Tech: Accelerating the Integration of Online and Offline in Pharma Digital Marketing – How Many Players Can This Vast Blue Ocean Accommodate?
Not long ago, Qingyun Technology officially announced that it had completed its Series B and B+ financing rounds, totaling hundreds of millions of yuan. The new round of financing not only attracted Alibaba Health, IDG Capital, and Life Capital as new shareholders, but also saw continued follow-on investments from existing shareholders such as Changling Capital and Lize Capital.
Driven by policy support and the pandemic, digital marketing in the pharmaceutical industry has reached new heights. As one of the earliest entrants into this field, Qingyun Technology has successfully secured a leading position in the industry. Its remote academic service model for physicians, centered on outstanding virtual representatives, stands out as unique within the sector. Following this round of financing, Qingyun Technology is poised to propel its business into a new stage of development.
Yan Guowei (Luis), founder of Qingyun Technology, reviewed the company’s fundraising journey with us: “During the angel round, our primary goal was to raise partial funding to address challenges related to customer payment terms. The Series A round was mainly aimed at team expansion and further validation of our business model. From late 2019 to the present, we have navigated the historic disruption of the pandemic, during which an explosion in demand drove rapid growth in our business and accelerated the upgrade of our business model. Therefore, the Series B financing is our first round since transitioning from online virtual representatives to a new phase of omnichannel marketing. Its main purposes are to strengthen our offline network and enhance our R&D capabilities.”
After four years of development, Qingyun Technology has rapidly evolved its strategic direction from a model primarily focused on online visits to an omnichannel approach integrating both online and offline channels. Amidst this strategic upgrade, what key changes have occurred at Qingyun Technology? Which core principles have been sustained? Furthermore, what trends in industry development are revealed by the transformation of Qingyun Technology?
As the helm of Qingyun Technology, Yan Guowei’s multifaceted background as a physician, pharmaceutical executive, and digital expert has endowed him with unique insights into the digitalization of pharmaceutical marketing, distinct from those of other industry practitioners. In the early stages of his venture, Yan accurately identified that primary-care hospitals are numerous and geographically dispersed, making offline representative visits costly yet low-yielding, while offering an ideal setting for rapidly validating the effectiveness of digital marketing strategies. Consequently, he positioned Qingyun Technology to serve primary-care hospitals, leveraging mature online solutions to assume the role of a “pioneer in omnichannel marketing solutions for primary-care hospitals.” As a result, primary-care hospitals became the key battleground for Qingyun Technology’s rapid breakthrough and market capture during its founding phase.
Yan Guowei summarized the success achieved by Qingyun Technology in recent years into three key points.
First, focus. Qingyun’s business has always revolved around the needs of physicians.All operational activities of Qingyun Technology are designed to uncover the latent academic needs of physicians. From daily physician interactions to high-frequency online events, Qingyun has been committed to identifying and exploring the diverse needs of primary care physicians, analyzing and refining them through various technological means. In Qingyun’s view, only by truly understanding and meeting the academic needs of primary care physicians can we better serve doctors and empower grassroots healthcare. The sales growth driven by digital marketing is a natural outcome of such highly personalized services.
Second, practice is the best driving force for technological application.Technologies that appear sophisticated do not necessarily achieve success at the application level. Therefore, Qingyun Technology has chosen to allow its systems and solutions to emerge and undergo continuous optimization through ongoing interaction with physicians, until they reach a stable form. Only in this way can the final technical solutions and functional modules become truly implementable applications that enhance efficiency.
Third, Qingyun Technology’s goal in digital marketing is long-term sustainability.Always emphasize compliance and pursue professionalism, while also acknowledging the current limitations of digital marketing. Facing the realities of industry development is no easy task, and it may entail forfeiting many business opportunities along the way. However, Qingyun believes that serving physicians while benefiting more patients represents a significant responsibility. Every commitment made in the process of pharmaceutical digital marketing must be accompanied by corresponding accountability; therefore, a value-oriented approach is essential, and overpromising must be avoided.
Regarding short-term plans for the future, Yan Guowei also revealed to us: “The company’s business development is currently proceeding smoothly, and there is still significant market potential to be tapped within the industry, so there will not be many major changes in the near term. HoweverSeveral dimensions will be the focus of our strategic deployment in the near future.First, the physician communityWe currently reach a base of approximately 400,000 primary care physicians. Given that the total number of physicians in China is nearly 4 million, there remains a substantial cohort who have not yet accessed our innovative digital academic services, representing a significant opportunity for further market expansion.Second is talent., we hope to attract more technical talents and pharmaceutical marketing professionals to join our cause, working together to build such an innovative academic marketing intelligent platform. Beyond these two points,We will also pay more attention to opportunities for cross-sector collaboration., especially for companies that are relatively leading in vertical sectors, we expect to achieve mutual benefit and win-win outcomes in business models.”
Following Qingyun Technology’s announcement of its financing, VCBeat recently held a conversation with Yan Guowei, founder of Qingyun Technology, aiming to interpret the development trends in digital pharmaceutical marketing from Qingyun Technology’s perspective. Below are excerpts of the highlights from this dialogue.
Catalyzed by the pandemic, the importance of digital marketing in the pharmaceutical industry has clearly become a consensus across the entire sector. This widespread influence has also extended to investors in the pharmaceutical industry.In the first half of the conversation, we focused on Qingyun Technology’s rapid development during the pandemic and the shifts in its strategic choices in the post-pandemic era.
VCBeat:During your communications with investors for Qingyun Technology’s Series B financing, how did your experience differ from that of previous funding rounds?
Yan Guowei:At a macro level, there is broad industry consensus on the importance and inevitability of digital transformation in the pharmaceutical sector. Investors are increasingly focusing on strategic positioning across different sub-sectors within this field and maintaining continuous tracking of leading enterprises. Therefore, during our recent round of communications with investors, we clearly observed two emerging core areas of focus.The first aspect concerns real-world cases: how many have truly succeeded? Can they deliver genuine commercial returns, from methodology to operational practice? The second aspect involves data and technical solutions. Physician data constitutes the foundation of grassroots infrastructure and serves as a critical resource barrier for us. Meanwhile, our technical solutions place greater emphasis on regulatory compliance, including the standardization of our Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) system in practical applications and data security issues.
VCBeat:The outbreak in 2020 significantly boosted the pharmaceutical digital marketing industry. What has been Qingyun Technology’s experience in its actual operations?
Yan Guowei:From the sudden onset of the pandemic to its establishment as the new normal, the changes perceived by our team have been striking. Across policy frameworks, pharmaceutical companies, and physicians, we have observed widespread recognition and acceptance of digital innovative marketing models. This shift has also brought substantial challenges. While digital transformation might originally have been a prolonged process, it has now become an urgent imperative, characterized by intense competition among numerous players.YouVirtual representatives, as a physician engagement model, are highly likely to become a standard feature in future pharmaceutical marketing models, much like how everyone today owns a mobile phone.
VCBeat:Based on our previous understanding of Qingyun, Qingyun Technology’s signature business has always been its “Sky Net” online marketing team, composed of virtual representatives conducting online visits. Why has the company recently decided to prioritize building an offline team?
Yan Guowei:Qingyun has always focused on the demand side of physicians. In certain core markets or key hospitals, physicians’ time constraints and communication preferences necessitate face-to-face interactions by our offline teams to deliver in-depth medical and product knowledge. Conversely, physicians in primary care settings require lighter academic support, primarily focusing on basic diagnostic and therapeutic skills as well as fundamental pharmacological knowledge; these physicians are better served through digital engagement channels. Naturally, there exists a transitional segment between these two markets, which may require a hybrid approach combining both online and offline models. Therefore,Our team-building logic centers on physicians’ needs. Since different physician groups have distinct communication preferences, we must align diverse communication channels accordingly.
In the past two years, with the rapid growth of the digital pharmaceutical marketing industry, solutions and industrial role distributions have become increasingly diversified, leading to growing discussions on security, compliance, and other related issues.In the latter half of the conversation, Yan Guowei shared with us his insights into the current industry landscape and Qingyun Technology’s strategies for addressing data security, a critical issue.
VCBeat:From our industry observations, a number of innovative enterprises have entered the pharmaceutical digital marketing sector in the past two years. How do you view these new entrants? Can this track accommodate so many companies?
Yan Guowei:It is indeed evident that many companies are leveraging their diverse resources to explore digital marketing initiatives.This sector is indeed still rife with opportunities, and every player has the potential to establish a business model suited to their needs. However, one point I wish to emphasize is that everyone must manage their expectations.Digital marketing is a long-term commitment; one should not rush into the field simply because resources and a business model are available. Only by grounding ourselves in practice and continuously refining our operational model over the long term can we achieve sustainable success. Although we started relatively early, there are still many areas where our methodologies need to be validated through practice. For instance, in specific vertical sectors, we must determine how our services can better meet the particular needs of clinicians. ThereforeDigital marketing in the pharmaceutical industry is a long-term endeavor, a slow-burn business that demands intensive operations and a strong focus on user experience.
VCBeat:Data security issues have once again sparked heated discussion recently. Qingyun Technology’s digital marketing process involves extensive data collection and application. How does Qingyun Technology address data security concerns in its digital marketing operations?
Yan Guowei:In terms of security, we observed early on that requirements for data security and privacy protection have been rapidly escalating across the board, from government regulators to pharmaceutical companies. We are proud to state that over the past year, we have obtained a series of domestic and international data security certifications, including China’s Classified Protection of Cybersecurity Level 3 (MLPS 2.0 Level 3) and ISO 27001. This achievement is closely attributable to our team’s dedicated efforts in advancing technical safeguards and establishing robust Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs). Furthermore, in response to newly enacted legal provisions, we have collaborated with external professional legal firms this year to develop a relatively comprehensive and tailored data security framework, specifically designed to address the unique characteristics of data security in digital marketing.Data security is of paramount importance to us; therefore, we will continue to prioritize it and maintain ongoing investment in data security and compliance.
VCBeat:How Do Pharmaceutical Companies Partnering with Qingyun Technology View the Digital Marketing Industry?
Yan Guowei:For pharmaceutical companies, digital marketing offers two key value propositions they prioritize.The primary value, of course, lies in the number of patients who have actually benefited from the drug., how many patients actually used the product and ultimately achieved better treatment outcomes.The second value lies in the extent to which digital marketing can empower the dissemination chain of physician education.. These two factors ultimately affect the economic returns that pharmaceutical companies can obtain.
VCBeat:Will digital marketing services become increasingly sticky for pharmaceutical companies?
Yan Guowei:Our longest-standing client has been partnering with us for over four years, essentially since the company’s inception.Pharmaceutical companies are indeed eager to maintain long-term partnerships, as this enables them to operate more efficiently and sustainably.Therefore, as long as we can provide excellent services to the physician community, customer stickiness will naturally continue to strengthen.