Pharmakeyring Launches E-Prescription Sharing Platform Backed by Winning Health and Ant Group, Targeting a Trillion-Yuan Market Opportunity

Recently, at the China Hospital Information Network Association Conference (CHIMA 2018), Winning Health held a launch event for its “Cloud Pharmacy” strategy. During the conference, KeyShiQuan, a company controlled by Winning Health with participation from Sinopharm Health, officially released an electronic prescription sharing and circulation platform. KeyShiQuan stated that it would leverage Winning Health’s support to fully integrate with Hospital Information Systems (HIS), connecting healthcare institutions with community pharmacies through a combined prescription sharing and pharmaceutical consortium platform, thereby facilitating the implementation of the “Internet + Prescription” model.

VCBeat (WeChat ID: vcbeat) interviewed Bu Guoxiu, Vice President of Yaoshiquan, and Zhang Ji, Head of Commercial Insurance Business. They stated that, against the backdrop of China’s new healthcare reforms, policies promoting the separation of prescribing and dispensing, tiered diagnosis and treatment, and compliant marketing are driving the inevitable trend of prescription outflow. In response, Yaoshiquan will establish an electronic prescription sharing platform to facilitate the separation of prescribing and dispensing and ensure the compliant and orderly circulation of prescriptions.

Yao Shiquan Vice President Bu Guoxiu Introduces the Construction Model of the Prescription Sharing Platform

KeyCare Circle was established in July 2015 and incubated by Winning Health and Sinopharm Health. The name “KeyCare Circle” is a homophone for “Pharmaceutical Care Circle” in Chinese. It aims to integrate industry strengths, including the drug supply system, physical pharmacy retail networks, Winning Health’s Hospital Information System (HIS), and Pharmacy Benefit Management (PBM) tools. By fostering collaboration among hospitals, pharmacies, pharmaceutical companies, basic medical insurance, and commercial insurance, KeyCare Circle provides high-value pharmaceutical care services to patients and insured individuals. These services include drug supply assurance and prescription circulation, thereby reducing information asymmetry, maximizing the efficiency of social resources, and achieving win-win outcomes for all stakeholders.

YaoShiQuan is the implementation platform for Winning Health’s “Cloud Pharmacy” strategy. As a leading domestic provider of healthcare information technology (HIT), Winning Health has, in recent years, leveraged its robust HIT foundation to actively expand and transform into the health services sector. The company has established a “4+1” cloud service system—comprising Cloud Medicine, Cloud Pharmacy, Cloud Wellness, Cloud Insurance, and an Innovation Service Platform. This initiative fosters a new model of health services characterized by a regional focus, integration as the cornerstone, and seamless online-offline convergence, while incorporating Internet-plus elements across healthcare, pharmaceuticals, and insurance. Through this approach, Winning Health aims to transition from software services to comprehensive health services.

On June 15, 2018, Shanghai Yunxin, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Ant Financial, made a strategic investment in Winning Health. With Ant Financial’s equity participation, Winning Health will accelerate the internet transformation of the healthcare and pharmaceutical industry on top of its traditional informatization foundation, with cloud-based pharmaceutical services represented by “Yao Shi Quan” serving as a key component.

In August 2017, Keyshijuan secured nearly RMB 200 million in investment from numerous industry investors, including Winning Health, Sinopharm Health, Qianji Capital, and Zhizhong Investment (Supor Industrial Investment). Within just over two years, the company completed the integration and acquisition of nearly ten enterprises. In 2018, Keyshijuan integrated with Ruyi, and Bu Guoxiu, CEO of Ruyi, was appointed Vice President of Keyshijuan.

The “Cloud Pharmacy” strategy is implemented in two phases. The first phase is primarily carried out through Yaoshiquan’s “Key Card” platform, which facilitates interconnectivity between insurance providers and pharmacies across China. This platform integrates upstream insurance institutions and their various insurance products with downstream chain pharmacies and medical terminals. By doing so, it not only enriches the service offerings and enhances the efficiency of commercial health insurance, thereby improving the service experience for insurance customers, but also effectively drives business growth for offline pharmacies.

YaoShiQuan is making every effort to assist insurance companies in developing new health service insurance products that are integrated into the Key Card service system. The goal is to enable more patients to access safe and high-quality medications more conveniently through collaborations with insurance companies, pharmaceutical manufacturers, chain pharmacies, and community health centers.

To date, Yaoshiquan has cumulatively served nearly 10 different types of insurance products, managed premiums totaling RMB 2.5 billion, partnered with over 60,000 pharmacies, and served nearly 400,000 insured individuals. Its users are distributed across 30 provinces and municipalities in China, with the platform’s total transaction volume reaching RMB 250 million and a sales growth rate exceeding 100%.

In the second phase of the Cloud Pharmacy Strategy, leveraging Winning Health’s nationwide presence in the Hospital Information System (HIS) sector for medical institutions, Yaoshi Circle will achieve interconnectivity of prescriptions between medical institutions and community pharmacies through its core internet products: the “Prescription Sharing Platform + Pharmaceutical Consortium Platform.”

The core highlight of this product is that KeyShiQuan will fully implement blockchain technology in its prescription-sharing platform, ensuring comprehensive visibility and traceability of prescriptions across relevant institutions and stakeholders, including medical institutions, physicians, licensed pharmacists, pharmacies, drug regulatory authorities, health commissions, and human resources and social security departments. Meanwhile, the Pharmaceutical Alliance segment targets chain pharmacies of all sizes nationwide, integrating a full suite of pharmacy-empowering services such as prescription interoperability, aggregated payment combined with direct commercial insurance billing, membership management, and online centralized procurement for retail pharmacies.

Bu Guoxiu, Vice President of Yaoshiquan, believes that healthcare reform has created opportunities for Direct-to-Patient (DTP) pharmaceutical services. Against the backdrop of the separation of prescribing and dispensing, hospitals are deliberately divesting from the supply of medications for chronic diseases and outpatient care, thereby stimulating demand for prescription circulation. While internet-based B2C and O2O channels remain constrained by policy restrictions, electronic prescription circulation and prescription-sharing platforms will become critical channels and mechanisms for handling prescriptions issued outside hospital settings. The Yaoshiquan Cloud Pharmacy strategy aims to genuinely advance the separation of prescribing and dispensing, enabling patients to freely and conveniently choose pharmacies and medication pickup methods, without exclusively favoring any specific pharmaceutical commercial company or retail chain.

Meanwhile, "Internet Plus" platforms and tools will facilitate prescription circulation by connecting doctors and patients via mobile apps, enabling post-consultation follow-ups and prescription renewals, thereby achieving seamless integration between auxiliary diagnosis and prescription flow.

Channels for absorbing outsourced prescriptions include hospital-adjacent pharmacies, specialty and new drug pharmacies, internet B2C platforms, O2O services, and prescription-sharing platforms. Electronic prescriptions and prescription-sharing platforms ensure the authenticity of prescriptions, facilitate compliant and orderly circulation, and enable effective regulatory oversight and continuous tracking.

On July 12, the National Health Commission issued the “Notice on Deepening Convenience and Benefit Activities for ‘Internet + Medical Health,’” encouraging qualified medical institutions to advance the development of “smart pharmacies” and achieve seamless integration between prescription systems and pharmacy dispensing systems, thereby facilitating timely medication pickup for the public. After online prescriptions are reviewed by pharmacists, medical institutions and pharmaceutical distributors may entrust qualified third-party agencies with delivery services.

Prior to this, cities such as Xi’an, Chengdu, and Chongqing had already issued regulations governing the circulation of electronic prescriptions, enabling retail pharmacies to integrate with healthcare institutions’ prescription systems and facilitate prescription transfer. Industry practices include models such as the Liuzhou Workers’ Hospital model by Tencent, the Wuzhou Red Cross Hospital model by Yi Fuzhen, and the Ningxia Internet Hospital model. With prescription outflow gaining momentum, Keyshiquan has chosen to enter the market at this juncture, capitalizing on a highly favorable timing.

The model of the Yaoshiquan Prescription Sharing and Circulation Platform involves establishing a prescription platform within medical institutions. Physicians issue prescriptions, which are then delivered to patients via multiple channels such as mobile apps, WeChat, and SMS. Patients may independently select pharmacies to fill their prescriptions. The National Health and Family Planning Commission and drug regulatory authorities can conduct real-time monitoring through the prescription information sharing platform. Pharmacists stationed at pharmacies review the prescriptions and print them for archival purposes, ensuring compliance with future regulatory requirements.

Yaoshi Circle: Drug-Insurance Linkage + Prescription Sharing Model

To enhance the security and reliability of the prescription sharing and circulation platform, KeyShiQuan has also integrated blockchain technology into the system. As one of the emerging technologies in recent years, blockchain leverages block-and-chain structures, distributed storage, asymmetric encryption algorithms, and smart contracts to provide the system with advantages such as traceability, immutability, and intelligent execution.

Bu Guoxiu, Vice President of KeyWorld, stated that the company’s prescription-sharing platform is currently being piloted in Tianjin and has already connected several hospitals and retail pharmacies. Once the model matures, it will be rolled out nationwide. During this expansion, resources from Winning Health and Sinopharm Health will provide significant momentum.