MedCircle Files for IPO Amid the Rise of Innovative Drug Digital Marketing

With the evolution of practices across various industries, healthcare reforms, and changes in the business environment driven by the pandemic, pharmaceutical companies’ activities such as sales representative visits and routine meetings have beenTraditional channels are becoming increasingly difficult to navigate, forcing enterprises to embrace the trend of digital transformation in their business operations.. Many pharmaceutical companies have shifted from a wait-and-see approach to actively increasing their investments in multi-channel digital marketing.

Riding the wave,Numerous internet healthcare and pharmaceutical companies are actively embracing the vast blue ocean of digital pharmaceutical marketing.. Among these, one trend is worth noting: according to the “2021 Innovation Report on Digital Marketing Services in the Pharmaceutical Industry” released by VCBeat, during the pandemic,Nearly 80% of Doctors Used Online Platforms to Access Medical Information During the Pandemic. Therefore,Digital pharmaceutical marketing centered on physicians has become one of the important approaches.

VCBeat has observed that a company named “Yixuejie” (Medical World) has precisely capitalized on this emerging trend. Yixuejie embarked on its entrepreneurial journey in 2012, initially aiming to publish a magazine that would provide users with comprehensive industry-related information covering clinical practice, academics, and management. In 2013–2014, the company fortuitously leveraged the WeChat boom, significantly expanding its user base through a matrix of WeChat subscription accounts. To enhance user retention and accumulate data, Yixuejie launched the Doctor Station APP in 2015, offering expert lectures and medical courses to facilitate physicians’ professional development. This strategic move also laid the groundwork for Yixuejie’s subsequent entry into the fast-growing sector of digital pharmaceutical marketing.

Over the nine years since its inception, “Medical Circle” has seen robust growth in its core business, with a compound annual growth rate of 88% over the past six years and 92% over the past three years. All of the top 30 pharmaceutical companies globally are clients of “Medical Circle.”In 2020, “Yixuejie” recorded order volumes exceeding RMB 200 million, ranking among the top in the physician platform industry.

“What kind of business model did ‘Yixuejie’ establish to enable the company to gain rapid momentum? What are its competitive barriers? What lessons can be drawn from its experience? To address these questions, VCBeat held a conversation with Chen Qirui on an early summer morning.”

(Founder of Yixuejie: Chen Qirui; Image provided by the interviewed company)

On the day of the interview, Chen Qirui was at the new “Yixuejie” office beside the Tonghui River in Beijing, organizing a lunch gathering with employees. He specifically instructed his assistant to seat the new hires next to him to foster mutual understanding.

“As the company’s workforce continues to expand, new employees have limited opportunities for communication with me; we need to create more chances for interaction and engagement,” Chen Qirui told VCBeat, emphasizing that team cohesion is a key factor driving the company’s sustained progress.

andThis emphasis on camaraderie brought considerable assistance to Chen Qirui during the early years of his entrepreneurial venture.“From 2016 to 2017, the company faced financing difficulties for a period. However, core employees united and worked together to support the company through the crisis and keep moving forward. Some partners even offered to use their personal savings to help the company weather the storm.”

In Chen Qirui’s view, it is precisely this team cohesion that has enabled “Jiemian” to maintain a smooth trajectory. In 2012, various media platforms under the “Jiemian” brand were launched successively, including the Jiemian website, the Jiemian mobile newsletter, the Jiemian Weibo account, and Jiemian Magazine.By strategically positioning itself early in the high-potential healthcare and wellness sector, capitalizing on the boom in social media, and leveraging strong operational capabilities, the company has demonstrated robust growth momentum across all platforms.In 2012, the number of Weibo followers and the level of engagement on the “Yixuejie” website rose significantly, propelling it to second place in the industry.

In the following years, capitalizing on the boom of WeChat subscription accounts, Chen Qirui assessed the situation and led his team to decisively abandon the print magazine, focusing instead on operating a matrix of WeChat subscription accounts. This strategy rapidly propelled the “Medical Circle” official account to become a leading media outlet in the medical profession. To date, “Medical Circle” operates 23 clinical channel WeChat official accounts, boasts over 10 million followers, achieves an average daily readership of 1.5 million, and has aggregated more than 2.5 million mainstream physicians.

Faced with a vast user base of physicians and substantial traffic, “Medical World” has decided to explore more high-value sectors.In August 2015, the Doctor Station app, designed to support physicians’ professional development, officially entered open beta testing. “Expert lectures are a primary means for knowledge updates among the vast number of physicians in China, whereas traditional Continuing Medical Education (CME) requires doctors to take leave and travel, entailing prohibitively high costs. Therefore, we have moved offline expert lectures online and developed structured course systems, enabling physicians to learn anytime and anywhere,” stated Chen Qirui.

The actual operational results have proven the forward-thinking nature of the concept. To date, the Doctor Station APP has accumulated 2.5 million installations, with over 2.3 million registered users. It has also launched more than 10,000 in-app academic lectures, covering over 32 clinical departments.In terms of engagement, the lectures have garnered over 70 million views, demonstrating high physician stickiness.

“As we continue to advance our business, we have found that by staying grounded and executing each step with care, thereby delivering tangible value to physician users, commercial success will naturally follow.” In Chen Qirui’s view,From its origins as a new media platform to its evolution into a learning and service platform for physicians, “MedTrend” has remained true to its original mission of “serving healthcare professionals and improving medical care.” This steadfast commitment has enabled “MedTrend” to seize opportunities as the next major industry trend emerges.

China’s healthcare and wellness industry is entering a golden age of historical development, with the innovative drug sector attracting particular attention from capital markets.

This lies in,Following the launch of national drug review reforms, China’s innovative drug industry has received greater support at the approval level.According to publicly available statistics, prior to the 2015 reform of the drug approval system, the review process for Investigational New Drug (IND) applications took approximately 11 months, while New Drug Applications (NDA) required about 28 months. Following the implementation of implicit approval for IND applications under the 2017 “Opinions on Deepening the Reform of the Review and Approval System to Encourage Innovation in Drugs and Medical Devices,” the approval timeline for new drugs has been reduced to within 60 days.The review and approval timeline for priority-designated new drug marketing applications averages 12 to 14 months, representing a nearly 50% reduction compared to previous durations.

It is against this backdrop that competition for new drug launches has become increasingly fierce, with major companies ramping up their market investments and gradually prioritizing digitalization to enhance marketing efficiency. According to the latest “Innovation Report on the Pharmaceutical Digital Marketing Services Industry” released by VCBeat,By 2025, the market size of China's digital pharmaceutical marketing industry is expected to exceed RMB 8 billion.

“Given the large base of physician users on the Doctor Station app, many pharmaceutical companies have approached us and gradually launched collaborative projects related to digital marketing,” said Chen Qirui. Pharmaceutical companies place great emphasis on precise traffic and seek access to physicians’ behavioral data analytics to inform their marketing strategies—capabilities that “Yixuejie” is well positioned to provide.

In response to this, Chen Qirui proposed the “6R Marketing Theory,” throughCustomer Screening(“Medical World” main database screens for target physician customers),Conducting Research(User Survey of Physician Behavior Database)Original Content(Produce content that reflects user preferences and maintains medical professionalism),Conduct outreach(reaching out via phone, offline events, etc.),VC Relations(Continuously maintain interactions and customer relationships with target physicians),Provide feedback(Conducting research feedback and results analysis, etc.) A solution has been developed across six aspects to assist prescription drug companies in upgrading their marketing strategies.

Meanwhile, in response to the need for prescription drug transformation and upgrading, “Medical World” has proposed a “one-stop digital marketing solution” that includes “master data management, scenario-based SaaS software, operational services, and customer value innovation.”

“By leveraging high-quality medical content and lecture courses, along with tools such as drug information lookup and guideline interpretation, we can retain physicians. Integrating offline visits and activities further enhances physician engagement, thereby completing the closed loop of information dissemination,” said Chen Qirui.In this closed-loop system, authentic and comprehensive physician behavior data can be collected. After statistical anonymization, business intelligence analysis can be applied to feed valuable insights back to pharmaceutical companies.

Chen Qirui believes that there are four key elements in the entire digital marketing process:First, high-value and easily digestible medical content; second, credible third-party platforms; third, integrated services combining online and offline channels; and fourth, a closed loop of behavioral data and marketing strategies.

Of course,Unlike direct-to-consumer businesses, B2B operations targeting pharmaceutical companies place greater emphasis on delivery capabilities and reputation.To this end, “Medical World” has internally established a “Capability Pyramid,” constructing a suite of services for top-tier users across three major dimensions: the resource layer, the capability layer, and the client layer. The results have been encouraging; it is reported that “Medical World’s” current clientele consists almost entirely of leading international innovative pharmaceutical companies, with revenue from innovative drugs accounting for over 80%, and customer satisfaction remaining high.Currently, over 60% of "Medical World"'s new business comes from client referrals, while the renewal rate for contracted pharmaceutical companies and drugs is close to 100%.。

From a medical new media platform to a learning and service platform for healthcare professionals, and further to a leading domestic digital marketing business for innovative drugs, “MedTrend” has continuously expanded its business boundaries at a steady pace of “a new strategy every three years,” albeit not at a rapid speed.

“Standing in the golden age of digital marketing for pharmaceuticals, there is still much worth doing,” said Chen Qirui. “Yixuejie” has formulated a “311 Plan” for its short- to medium-term goals: achieving an IPO within three years with a market capitalization of RMB 10 billion, and reaching a market capitalization of RMB 100 billion through ten years of operations. Over the next decade, Chen Qirui has set a target of RMB 100 billion in market capitalization for “Yixuejie.” How can this be achieved?

Chen Qirui responded: “Our Japanese peer, M3, derives over 80% of its revenue from the Japanese market and currently has a market capitalization of RMB 300 billion. China’s market potential is no smaller than Japan’s. As China’s pharmaceutical market transitions toward innovative drugs, several leading specialized healthcare industry service companies will emerge in China, just as they have in the Japanese and U.S. markets. We are confident that ‘Medicine World’ will be among them!”

Beyond simple analogies, on what basis can the “medical community” achieve this remarkable goal?

Chen Qirui believes:

1. Clear strategic guidance: Since its inception, “Yixuejie” has remained unwavering in its mission;

2. Based on internal capabilities and changes in the external environment, take “major strides every three years” to gradually drive the upgrading of strategy and organizational capabilities;

3. A professional, dedicated core team with a global perspective and localized operational capabilities.

“In this competitive arena, our team is more professional, more focused, more dynamic, and possesses a broader international perspective. We are confident in becoming the No. 1 player in this market.” Chen Qirui believes that the greatest challenge facing “Yixuejie” (Medical Community) now does not stem from industry competition, but rather from whether it can evolve into a better version of itself.