Baisheng Biotech Secures Nearly RMB 10 Million in Angel Funding to Advance Innovative Pathology Technologies

VCBeat (WeChat ID: vcbeat) has learned that Baisheng (Guangzhou) Biological Products Co., Ltd. (“Baisheng Bio”) announced this afternoon the signing of its angel round financing agreement with Yanghe Investment and Zhongda Venture Capital. Yanghe Investment led the round, with Zhongda Venture Capital participating as a co-investor. The financing amount is nearly RMB 10 million. The proceeds will be primarily used to advance market expansion for tumor immunohistochemistry products and to support subsequent product research and development.

Baisheng (Guangzhou) Biological Products Co., Ltd. is a medical device manufacturer located in the Nansha Industrial Park of Guangdong Medical Valley. Established in December 2018, its founding team comprises pathology experts holding postdoctoral, doctoral, and master’s degrees, as well as overseas-educated professionals. The company specializes in the field of tumor pathology. Its monoclonal antibody reagents were approved for market launch in September 2019 and are currently used by more than 30 medical institutions, including the Second Affiliated Hospital of Guangzhou Medical University and the Air Force Hospital of the Southern Theater Command.

The company’s pioneering high-throughput immunohistochemistry (IHC) stainer, combined with its independently developed polymeric enzyme-labeled secondary antibody (blocking type), achieves a perfect integration of instrument and consumables, providing a standardized solution for IHC staining. This stainer revolutionizes traditional IHC technology, offering advantages of high throughput, high efficiency, and superior quality. Having completed all pre-market registration and approval processes, the company plans to fully launch commercial sales in July this year. It is committed to serving a broad base of pathology customers with robust product quality and professional after-sales support.

It is reported that Baisheng Biological has registered nearly 200 medical products and filed multiple invention patents and utility model patents.

Regarding the completion of this round of financing, VCBeat (WeChat ID: vcbeat) conducted an exclusive interview with Dr. Tan Ruizheng, founder of Baisheng Biological, to analyze from multiple perspectives what makes Baisheng Biological attractive to investors.

Dr. Tan Ruizheng graduated from Toulouse Business School in France and previously served as a technician in the chemistry and microbiology laboratories at Baxter. With 18 years of experience in pharmaceutical and medical device sales, Dr. Tan emphasizes innovation in strategy and planning. During his four years of study in France, he engaged in extensive pathological academic collaborations with the Medical Innovation Centers of Toulouse University and Toulouse Business School, and has accumulated rich experience in team leadership and corporate governance.

When asked why Baisheng Biological has gained investor recognition, Dr. Tan Ruizheng first highlighted the company’s core patented technologies: “Core technology patents are the primary prerequisite for our company to secure financing. We hold two complementary invention patents—one for an instrument, the High-Throughput Repair Instrument, and the other for a reagent, the Polymeric Enzyme-Labeled Secondary Antibody. After years of dedicated research and development on the High-Throughput Repair Instrument, we have completed all pre-market preparations and are poised to deploy it in hospital clinical departments.”

“Secondly, investors conduct highly professional research on both the sector and the companies involved, carrying out comprehensive evaluations with meticulous precision and scientific rigor. They are able to examine industry development from a strategic perspective while also assessing whether a company possesses strong development potential based on its core competitiveness, ultimately determining whether to invest in the enterprise.”

Dr. Tan Ruizheng highlighted the company’s independently developed fully automated immunohistochemistry (IHC) stainer, which can simultaneously stain 240 tissue sections in a single run. Its efficiency is eight times that of imported instruments, with a staining time significantly shorter than similar products, completing the process within three hours. This high throughput and efficiency are attributed to the R&D team’s continuous innovation in IHC staining technology, incorporating unique slide-loading and heat-induced epitope retrieval (HIER) techniques. These advancements ensure more thorough and uniform staining while allowing more slides to be accommodated within the same footprint, thereby enabling multi-fold increases in sample capacity per run and substantially reducing the workload for pathology customers.

Fully automated immunohistochemistry (IHC) stainers are essential for ensuring standardized staining results. Currently, low-throughput stainers on the market are increasingly unable to meet the growing demand for sample processing, necessitating that pathology departments adopt high-throughput instruments to alleviate heavy daily workloads and reduce the turnaround time for delivering pathology reports to patients. High-throughput fully automated IHC stainers effectively address these challenges. It is predictable that the future trend will favor high-throughput, fully automated instruments.

Currently, Baisheng Biological’s antibody reagents are in use at more than 30 hospitals across China, with its fully automated immunohistochemistry (IHC) stainer set to launch shortly. Notably, the company currently offers open-system secondary antibodies for pathology applications, enabling customers to perform manual IHC staining on tumor tissue sections. Following the market introduction of Baisheng Biological’s fully automated IHC stainer, the company will introduce closed-system secondary antibody reagents specifically matched one-to-one with the instrument, facilitating fully automated IHC testing and reducing random errors associated with manual procedures.

“From a market perspective, China’s oncology pathology testing industry is still at a relatively basic stage. This stands in contradiction to the rapidly growing number of cancer patients, as both incidence and mortality rates continue to rise, yet standardized approaches for precise cancer detection remain lacking.” Dr. Tan Ruizheng cited the second reason for Baisheng Biological’s recognition by investors as its choice of the right strategic niche: “Baisheng Biological’s technology can address certain pathological technical challenges in the current market, particularly in the areas of cellular, protein, molecular, and genetic testing, thereby filling existing technological gaps and unmet market needs.”

Regarding the team, Dr. Tan Ruizheng emphasized its critical importance. In addition to prioritizing the founders’ credentials and technological innovation capabilities, investors also pay close attention to the overall composition of the team: “The talent structure at Baisheng Biological Products is characterized by complementary strengths. Dr. Zhang, who heads our R&D efforts, has over twenty years of experience in the research, development, and production of pathological reagents. He previously served as R&D Director at two multinational corporations, accumulating extensive expertise in establishing production workshops, quality control, post-market product quality tracking, and achieving breakthrough technological innovations. Mr. Gong, co-founder of the company, brings rich experience in establishing and optimizing product quality systems. With a deep understanding of the pathology industry and market, he offers unique insights into the design and application of high-throughput instruments and possesses an extensive network of pathology experts and market resources. Engineer Li from our R&D team demonstrates strong proficiency in mechanical principle design and software development. He has optimized operational procedures to make them simpler and faster, thereby enhancing user flexibility and convenience. Looking ahead, our R&D team is poised to achieve new technological breakthroughs in novel antibodies, special staining techniques, and molecular diagnostics.”

Regarding the investment in Baisheng Biological, this investment'sMr. Li Xiaoming, Chairman of Yanghe InvestmentStatement: We have been committed to early- and mid-stage investments in the medical device sector, focusing on niche segments. By leveraging industry resources to guide our investment activities, we help portfolio companies achieve steady and rapid growth. Pathology is an emerging and high-potential niche within the medical device industry. The founding team of Baisheng Medical possesses extensive experience in the pathology sector, and we are confident that Baisheng will become an industry leader.

Regarding this investment,Zheng Guihui, President of Zhongda Venture CapitalIt was stated that pathological diagnosis is the gold standard for disease diagnosis and holds significant importance for clinical diagnosis. However, pathology testing and diagnostic techniques in China are generally at a relatively basic stage, and there is a shortage of pathologists. With the development of the healthcare industry, Zhongda Venture Capital is optimistic that this market sector will enter a period of rapid growth. Meanwhile, the Baisheng team has demonstrated strong execution capabilities and determination, from settling into the Guangdong Medical Valley Park to establishing a robust production system. We believe that Baisheng (Guangzhou) Biological Products Co., Ltd. is poised to become a rising star in the field of pathological diagnosis.

Yanghe Investment was established in January 2013, with its registered address in Qianhai, Shenzhen. It was jointly funded by four listed medical device companies: Improve Medical, Hejia Shares, Blue Sail Medical, and David Medical. Yanghe Investment focuses on early- to mid-stage investments in the medical device sector. Leveraging its industrial resource background, a stable investment team, and a focus on specialized industry segments, the firm aims to guide its investment activities through industrial resources to deliver sustained performance returns to investors. By harnessing the resources of its alliance of listed companies, Yanghe Investment participates in projects across diverse fields, technologies, and business models within the industry, thereby guiding strategic development directions and helping partners continuously expand their industry influence.

Zhongda Venture Capital, established in 2011 with the approval of Sun Yat-sen University, is an emerging industry investment institution dedicated to fully leveraging the advantages and resources of Chinese universities in technological innovation, industrial research, and talent development. It mobilizes and allocates social capital to support the commercialization of scientific and technological achievements. Adhering to the development philosophy of industrial clustering, industrial finance, and innovative ecosystems, Zhongda Venture Capital focuses its investments on emerging sectors such as new healthcare, new materials, and advanced manufacturing.