E99: Empowering the Next Generation of Healthcare Investors Files IPO Prospectus

In early November 2018, Shenzhen had not yet officially entered winter. After a morning of project discussions, the teams from Qingcheng Capital and Touhu.com chatted about “attending conferences” over lunch.

Young investors who are new to the industry are eager to expand their professional networks and enrich their industry resources. Most of them start by attending conferences, aiming to quickly establish initial connections with peers and entrepreneurs through face-to-face interactions. However, due to the high frequency of events, investors often encounter scheduling conflicts or venues located in remote areas. After spending considerable time traveling to the event location, many interactions are reduced to brief encounters and mere exchanges of business cards. Yet, how can such superficial networking satisfy young investors’ need to establish themselves in the industry and engage in in-depth exchanges?

“Let’s build a platform for young investors to network and grow.” Zhao Yanyu, founder of Touhu.com, and Sun Liqing, partner at Qingcheng Capital, independently arrived at the same idea. However, as both hail from the venture capital and private equity industry, they recognized that “platform-building initiatives require support from an independent third party, preferably a media organization.”

Zhao Yanyu had previously interacted with VCBeat and strongly endorsed its commitment to empowering innovative enterprises. Given the strong logical connection between this mission and supporting the growth of young investors, she promptly contacted Bi Yuanfeng, COO of VCBeat.

At that time, the VCBeat Annual Conference—2019 Future Healthcare 100 Forum—had entered its final stage. Upon receiving the news, Bi Yuanfeng remarked, “I felt very positive about it at the time, as it aligns closely with VCBeat’s vision of driving transformative change in the innovative healthcare industry. An era of industrial transformation inevitably gives rise to entrepreneurs and investors who define that period. I believe that supporting the growth of young investors will also benefit the entire industry.”

After discussions among the three parties, the organization was named the Medical and Health Investment Elite Alliance. “Elite” signifies excellence in English, while “99” symbolizes longevity; hence, the abbreviation E99 was adopted. Leveraging professional knowledge sharing and exchange in medical and health investment and financing as its foundation, and high-quality medical and health projects as a bridge, E99 precisely connects project sponsors with investors, striving to build an influential ecosystem for medical and health venture capital and entrepreneurship.

“We initially aimed to resonate with a group of young, dynamic frontline investors in the investment community, particularly within the healthcare sector, who are passionate about their careers and eager to contribute their individual efforts to support investment projects. Our goal was to establish an organization tailored specifically for these professionals.” In Zhao Yanyu’s view, investors need opportunities for dialogue, perspectives benefit from constructive clash, and projects require sustained support from diverse types of institutions. Through exchange and sharing, participants can mutually promote each other’s development and achieve common growth.

Zhao Yanyu stated that young professionals entering the investment industry are initially driven by the desire to identify high-quality projects and provide superior post-investment services. However, as newcomers, these investors often lack extensive professional networks and industrial resources. E99 creates a platform tailored to their professional networking needs, enabling young investors to engage with current industry hotspots and facilitate cross-institutional collaboration on projects, thereby enhancing service quality. Zhao Yanyu remarked, “It is highly meaningful to accompany a cohort of passionate young people as they grow and mature within the investment sector. By following their journey, we will witness emerging trends and new blueprints for the development of the healthcare industry.”

“To put it simply, this community is about collectively evaluating and investing in projects, enabling investors to grow through practice. However, we need a concrete format for this—namely, organizing roadshows, with the showcased projects recommended by investors from the E99 Alliance.” In Sun Liqing’s view, the investment circle should be an open community where members embrace a mindset of sharing, learning, and collaboration.

“No one can become an expert overnight,” said Sun Liqing, noting that investment preferences may vary among individuals. Within the broad sector of life and health, there are numerous specialized subfields. Through E99, participants can share projects, industry insights, and investment experiences, fostering collaborative growth among young investors.

“E99’s investors are all active, front-line investors who engage directly with projects and entrepreneurs on a daily basis. Their timely and fresh perspectives are likely to represent the direction of the industry’s development.” In Bi Yuanfeng’s view, these young, front-line investors are a group with immense potential.

Bi Yuanfeng stated, “In this era of industrial transformation, the venture capital sector is generating a wealth of new insights. These insights often stem from frontline investors—specifically, the cumulative reflections gathered by outstanding investors through extensive interactions with portfolio companies. Such experience and thinking will ultimately evolve into intellectual capital for the healthcare industry, serving as beacons and lighthouses to guide its development, with some even becoming the cornerstones of the entire industrial architecture. Through our participation in E99, we aim to identify young investors who embody these qualities.”

Bi Yuanfeng stated that, as a media platform, VCBeat possesses inherent attributes for dissemination. Through such outreach, it can not only attract more young investors but also generate momentum and amplify the voice of events organized by E99.

In terms of specific operations, VCBeat first conducts interviews with investors to understand their perspectives and insights into the current industrial development. Secondly, VCBeat also interviews projects recommended by these investors and engages in further communication with the respective entrepreneurs.

Furthermore, Bi Yuanfeng revealed that VCBeat could leverage its established brand strengths, such as the "Top 100 Future Healthcare Companies" list, to potentially launch a "Young Investors List." This initiative aims to encourage young investors to enter the field and gain a genuine understanding of the industry.

Sun Liqing stated that Qingcheng Capital is the initiating representative of the E99 Alliance’s venture capital institutions, primarily leading and responsible for organizing dedicated roadshows and salons.

Regarding its competitive advantages, Sun Liqing stated that the Qingcheng Capital team, in collaboration with Shenzhen’s science and technology authorities and more than 10 mainstream venture capital firms in Shenzhen, initiated the establishment of a series of innovation competition funds a decade ago. The team has organized the China Shenzhen Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition for consecutive years and made bundled investments in over 30 award-winning projects from the competition.

Furthermore, in recent years, Qingcheng Capital has frequently convened and organized venture capital peers to jointly evaluate and invest in projects. Notably, Qingcheng Capital specializes in early-stage investments, thereby garnering substantial government support and maintaining frequent communication with governmental authorities. This enables the firm to promptly convey the latest government policies to portfolio companies, serving as a bridge between project founders and the government.

Zhao Yanyu stated that, as a venture capital service platform in the medical and health sector, VCBeat already hosts thousands of professional institutional investors and individual investors. Additionally, it annually welcomes hundreds of project founders and industry experts into VBInsight. VCBeat will fully leverage its advantages as a platform integrating industry, academia, investment, and financing to continuously empower the long-term development of E99.

Meanwhile, VCBeat will also be primarily responsible for the strategic development and back-end management of E99, including the collection and organization of investment and financing information and event data, event planning and execution, official WeChat account promotion, and platform operation and maintenance. In addition, VCBeat has newly launched VBInsight. E99 members can leverage the expert resources of this think tank to enhance their professional capabilities and pursue continuous learning and improvement through thematic sharing sessions, salons, or online courses.

The harsh winter of 2018 brought rationality back to the investment community. Although 2019 remained chilly, a year of reflection has made investors more grounded, and after a year of “reshuffling,” there is an even greater need for communication among investors.

Many hands make light work. Sun Liqing stated that E99 gathers young, frontline investors with an open mindset. These investors also embrace openness, learning, and collaboration. Through the joint efforts of E99 and its investors, the development of the healthcare and wellness industry is being driven forward.

Sun Liqing stated that, for E99, the greatest hope is that members can invest in star projects, thereby expanding their own influence as investors while also enhancing E99’s visibility.

Zhao Yanyu stated that E99 brings together the most grounded, diligent, insightful, and sensitive frontline investors, enabling them to truly evaluate, reflect, and communicate from a professional and pure perspective.

In Zhao Yanyu’s view, the growth of investors requires continuous cultivation through case studies. E99 also aims to foster more professional investors, facilitate more investment and financing deals through project communications, and drive the healthy development of the healthcare investment industry.

Bi Yuanfeng stated that while E99 holds many possibilities for the future, its immediate priority is to provide support for young investors and high-quality projects. The goal is to foster a collective intelligence ecosystem—“pooling wisdom to build strength”—in areas such as understanding industry landscapes and future prospects, deconstructing the growth trajectories of benchmark enterprises, and helping companies avoid common developmental pitfalls.

Front-line investors interested in joining the E99 Alliance may scan the QR code to complete the expression of interest form: