Haalthy Secures New Funding to Accelerate Development of Digital Therapeutics Platform for Lung Cancer Research and Treatment

VCBeat (WeChat ID: vcbeat) has learned that Beijing Pengshu Weili Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “Haalthy”), an internet-based one-stop health big data service platform dedicated to lung cancer research and treatment through digital therapeutics, has just completed a new round of financing.

This round of financing was co-led by Chengdu Zhenchuanghe. Previously, Haalthy had received financial support from FreeS Fund and Panda Capital. The funds from this round will be primarily used for the clinical validation and commercialization preparation of the company’s digital therapeutics products.

According to the latest 2020 global cancer burden data released by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) of the World Health Organization, there were 19.29 million new cancer cases worldwide in 2020, including 2.2 million new lung cancer cases, second only to breast cancer in terms of incidence.

In 2020, there were nearly 9.96 million cancer-related deaths worldwide, with lung cancer accounting for nearly 1.8 million deaths—far exceeding other cancer types and ranking first in cancer mortality. It is projected that by 2025, the number of lung cancer patients in China will reach 1 million, making China the country with the highest burden of lung cancer globally.

Global Cancer Death Toll Statistics in 2020. Image source: IARC

Haalthy, established in November 2015, is a company specializing in lung cancer-related medical science popularization, medical data analysis, and patient enrollment and follow-up data services.The company’s lung cancer patient service platform, “FeiTeng Assistant,” which is strategically aligned with digital therapeutics, is an integrated internet-based one-stop health big data service platform combining medical science popularization, medical data analysis, patient enrollment, and follow-up.

Patient Services Provided by Haalthy | Source: Haalthy Official Website

“LungTeng Assistant” provides users with data services for enhancing drug efficacy, overall survival/self-management, and side effect management, while also helping to alleviate patients’ psychological burden. Long-term follow-up data show that “LungTeng Assistant” reduced patients’ psychological burden by 44% and provided early warnings for 30% of severe side effects within one year.

Haalthy conducts patient education and related clinical care services through online communities, attracting a large number of patients to participate in lung cancer research projects. While assisting physicians in analyzing complex cancer challenges, Haalthy collaborates with pharmaceutical companies to introduce new drugs into China, thereby uncovering more treatment options and offering patients hope for a cure.

Haalthy New Drug Introduction and R&D Project Image Source: Haalthy Official Website

Currently, “Lung Teng Assistant” has amassed over 70,000 lung cancer patients as users, published more than 2,000 informational articles, and completed over 140,000 lung cancer-related Q&A sessions. The company maintains mature and stable collaborative relationships with renowned experts from prestigious domestic and international institutions, including the Cancer Hospital of the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, West China Hospital, Liaoning Cancer Hospital, the Mayo Clinic in the United States, and UC Irvine.

Digital Therapeutics (DTx) provide patients with interventions based on evidence-based medicine and driven by high-quality software programs to prevent, manage, or treat diseases. They can be used alone, in combination with medications, or alongside other therapies to improve patients' health outcomes.

This necessitates that, for digital therapeutics to function effectively as a disease management solution, they require not only pharmacological support but also strong patient adherence. To fundamentally address this challenge, a profound understanding and mastery of patients’ clinical data and behavioral cognition are essential. Haalthy’s product, “FeiTeng Assistant,” was designed precisely with this principle in mind.

“By providing users with services such as community engagement and clinical trial enrollment, and by conducting research projects on cutting-edge lung cancer knowledge in collaboration with renowned physicians in China, the United States, and around the world, Haalthy has accumulated a substantial volume of continuous raw data on patient diagnosis, treatment, and cognitive behaviors.”

“We believe that only products developed based on such data can truly address patients’ disease management needs, thereby improving their diagnostic and therapeutic outcomes, while also realizing the value of software as a digital therapeutic product.”

The product design philosophy, which centers closely on patients, is inseparable from another identity held by members of the Haalthy team—that of being family members of cancer patients. In addition to clinical experts such as oncologists and postdoctoral researchers with over 18 years of experience in oncology, as well as Ph.D. holders in Computer Science from Sun Yat-sen University and experts in AI analytics, many members of the Haalthy team are themselves family members of cancer patients.

: “As family members of the patient, our core value is that all actions should be centered on maximizing patient benefit.Haalthy’s digital therapeutics products are designed not only to generate commercial value but also to tangibly alleviate patients’ physical and psychological suffering, which serves as a key driving force behind our team’s continued progress.

We are a group of patients’ family members, advocates eager to drive medical reform, cautious yet pioneering medical scientists, and ordinary individuals aspiring to contribute to society.。”

At this stage, Haalthy remains focused on validating the clinical value of its products. In the future, Haalthy aims to build itself into a patient service platform rooted in China and benefiting patients worldwide, contributing to the advancement of human health and fostering international cooperation in the healthcare industry.

Regarding this round of investment in Haalthy, the investor Chengdu Zhenchuanghe stated that cancer care can now leverage a wide range of multidimensional approaches for early prevention, management, and treatment. Digital therapeutics, as software-based interventions, provide diagnostic and therapeutic support to patients for prevention, while enabling timely acquisition and synchronization of clinical data with both patients and their families.

For novel chronic diseases, digital therapeutics have evolved from a singular treatment modality into a clinical data platform characterized by multi-source data integration and doctor-patient interaction, thereby elevating digital therapy to a new level and fostering a comprehensive industrial closed loop encompassing the AI sector, pharmaceuticals, and integrated screening and intervention.

Liu Yu, CEO of Chengdu Zhenchuanghe, stated“Haalthy is one of the few companies in China currently focused on developing digital products for lung cancer and other oncological diseases. It has established numerous collaborations with leading international pharmaceutical manufacturers, achieving an integration of digital therapeutics-assisted medical care and new technology expansion. Essentially, it has laid a solid foundation for becoming a data-driven healthcare management company.”

We will remain bullish on Haalthy and continue to support it by providing assistance across multiple dimensions—including capital, talent, market channels, and industry resources—to help it rapidly secure all the essential elements required for the entire industry. In the near term, we will also leverage government agencies and medical institutions to facilitate the preliminary work and project implementation of digital therapeutics.

“We believe that the future will see the emergence of many leading companies in digital therapeutics and data management, and these innovative technologies will undoubtedly establish new milestones in the healthcare sector.”