Sichuan Tietou Information Technology Investment Co., Ltd. Files Prospectus for Provincial-Level Big Data Health Platform
At the 2016 National “Internet + Healthcare” Innovation and Entrepreneurship Conference, hosted by the Chinese Health Information Association and the Sichuan Provincial Health and Family Planning Commission,The Provincial Health and Family Planning Commission, the China-US Health Summit Organization, Sichuan Provincial People's Hospital, and Proactive Healthcare Management Co., Ltd. formally signed the "Strategic Cooperation Agreement on Promoting a People-Centered Proactive Health Service Model," followed by the Provincial Health and Family Planning Commission, the China-US Health Summit,China Electronics Technology Software Information Service Co., Ltd. and Sichuan Railway Investment Information Technology Industry Investment Co., Ltd. also signed the "Strategic Cooperation Agreement on Promoting Active Health Big Data,"The signing of the two agreements marksChina's First Proactive Health Industry Alliance.
Sichuan has emerged as a national hub for medical innovation and entrepreneurship in China. Stakeholders ranging from the Sichuan Provincial Committee of the Communist Party of China and the Sichuan Provincial People’s Government, to state-owned enterprises, local businesses, capital investors, and international experts, have all converged in Sichuan. The Active Health Alliance serves as a key engine driving this medical innovation and entrepreneurial ecosystem in the province.
It is understood that the Proactive Health Alliance is committed to innovating Sichuan’s local healthcare model. By studying and integrating advanced transformation experiences from both domestic and international sources, the alliance actively advocates for institutional, model, and technological innovation. Adhering to the principles of openness, integration, co-construction, and sharing, it aims to build a forward-looking new service system for “Proactive Health,” thereby supporting the development of the health industry in Sichuan and across China.
Seizing this opportunity, VCBeat(WeChat ID: vcbeat)A series of related articles will be launched, providing in-depth coverage of the Active Health Industry Alliance and its member enterprises, government bodies, and experts, thereby maintaining a continuous focus on the progress of medical innovation and entrepreneurship in Sichuan. Please stay tuned to VCBeat.
Photo: Signing Ceremony of the Proactive Health Industry Alliance
Sichuan TieTou Information Technology Industry Investment Co., Ltd. is one of the corporate signatories to the “Strategic Cooperation Agreement on Promoting Proactive Health Big Data.” This Agreement aims to achieve closed-loop population management based on data-driven proactive screening, prevention, care, and outcome assessment for target populations. It will provide residents with human-centered, precise, and personalized health services covering the entire lifecycle, offer intelligent single-disease specialist services with “cognitive” capabilities, and implement comprehensive quality supervision based on indicators such as service delivery processes, quality outcomes, and patient responsiveness. Furthermore, leveraging the development of medical informatization infrastructure (“high-speed rail”), the integration of proactive health big data, and the establishment of an autonomous, controllable, and secure system, the company will build a medical big data operational platform and a medical cloud ecosystem.
Sichuan Railway Investment Group is a traditional, super-large state-owned enterprise focused on transportation infrastructure investment and construction. Why does it intend to enter the healthcare industry? Which specific segments of the healthcare sector does it prioritize? What concerns and reservations arise from transitioning from investing in traditional industries to entering the healthcare sector?
In this regard, VCBeat (WeChat ID: vcbeat) interviewed Sichuan Railway InvestmentInformation Technology Industry Investment Co., Ltd.Chairman Zhou Huwei granted an exclusive interview, interpreting the company’s investment layout in the medical sector.
According to Zhou Huwei, the 13th Five-Year Plan of China Railway Investment Group aims to transform it by 2021 into a modern, comprehensive, ultra-large state-owned enterprise group with cross-industry, cross-regional, and multinational operations, achieving annual operating revenue exceeding RMB 100 billion and total assets surpassing RMB 350 billion.
The core business of the current railway group is mainly concentrated in the field of transportation infrastructure such as railways and highways. To optimize, strengthen, and expand the enterprise, it must pursue diversified development, further expand market space, and actively cultivate new economic growth points.
As the nation attaches great importance to the pioneering role of informatization, it has elevated informatization to a national strategy. Efforts are being made to apply Internet thinking to advance supply-side structural reform, promote transformations in production methods and organizational models, and drive the deep integration of the Internet with all sectors of the economy and society. Against this backdrop, built upon next-generation information technologies, “Internet Plus” is not only the optimal path for China’s industrial economy to achieve “overtaking on a bend,” but also an inevitable choice for the leapfrog development of the Railway Investment Group.
Consequently, the Group has designated the information technology sector as its tenth major business segment and established Sichuan Railway Investment Information Technology Industry Investment Co., Ltd. as a wholly-owned subsidiary. As the first and currently only provincial-level state-owned enterprise to have set up an information investment company, Sichuan Railway Investment Group has organically and effectively integrated its resource advantages with the Internet. This move has enabled the Group to expand beyond its existing industrial landscape, which is dominated by heavy assets and long cycles, by developing new business segments characterized by light assets and short cycles, thereby enhancing the diversification of its overall business portfolio. Since its establishment, the Information Investment Company has been deeply committed to its core mission of “transformation and upgrading, diversified development, and innovation ecosystem.” Its participation in the “Internet + Healthcare” Conference to explore the healthcare industry represents a solid step forward for the company.
Currently, the Sichuan Railway Investment Group has made substantial investments across various cities and prefectures in Sichuan Province, with cumulative investments reaching RMB 200 billion over the past three years. Its investment portfolio not only covers major infrastructure projects in transportation sectors such as railways, highways, light rail, and ports, but also extends to sectors closely related to urban life, including commercial real estate, industrial parks, tourism, health and elderly care, and education. The group currently holds land reserves of more than 30,000 mu within the province. Notably, the “Sanxing Area Project of Tianfu Water City New District” in the Jintang County New Urbanization Comprehensive Pilot Zone alone is planned for an investment of RMB 10 billion. Construction components include a Danish fairy-tale-themed amusement park, underground utility tunnels, sponge city infrastructure, and educational and healthcare facilities, aiming to create a new city that is smart and intensive, ecologically livable, and harmoniously developed.
In the course of implementing numerous new-type urbanization projects, healthcare has emerged as the most critical component. Leveraging new paradigms such as “Internet Plus,” along with next-generation information technologies like big data and cloud computing, to make medical care more accessible for patients, alleviate physicians’ workload, and enhance the quality of primary healthcare has become a key focus and challenge in future new-type urbanization efforts. This naturally constitutes one of the priority tasks for Information Investment Company in its next phase of development.
On the other hand, China Railway Investment Group regards the economic, political, and social responsibilities borne by state-owned enterprises (SOEs) as its own honor and historical mission. Over the years, through solid investment and construction efforts across various cities and prefectures, the group has wholeheartedly served local governments, stimulated regional economic development, and improved people’s living standards, thereby establishing a strong reputation and brand effect while earning the trust of local governments. In the field of healthcare, which is closely tied to public welfare, there is an even greater need for a large, trustworthy SOE that considers boosting local development its duty and remains resilient against the fluctuations of capital markets, so as to drive the rapid growth of the local medical industry through strategic investments. Therefore, in the healthcare sector, China Railway Investment Group’s reputation and historical legacy will become the company’s greatest assets.
Although TieTou Group has extensive experience in investing in other industries, Zhou Huwei remains highly cautious about healthcare investments. He considers healthcare investment to be a “deep-water zone” that relies on resources from various stakeholders, including local governments and hospitals, whose attitudes play a decisive role in the development of the healthcare industry. “Currently, the proportion of our company’s investments in the healthcare sector is very low. This year, we have specifically established a healthcare investment division with a team of dozens of professionals, aiming to increase our investments in healthcare.”
Healthcare investment is a relatively specialized segment within the investment industry. The Tie Tou Group has consistently adhered to the principle of preserving and increasing the value of state-owned assets in all its investment activities, strictly prohibiting any loss of state-owned assets. Therefore, rigorous review processes are applied to every investment project, including those in the healthcare sector.
At the “Internet + Healthcare” Conference, Tietou Group joined the Proactive Health Industry Alliance and, together with its partners, the Sino-US Health Summit and CETC Software & Information Technology Co., Ltd., signed strategic cooperation agreements with the Sichuan Provincial Health and Family Planning Commission and the Wenjiang District Government, respectively. Under the agreement with the Provincial Health and Family Planning Commission, the initiative will focus on proactive health and big data services at a provincial scale across Sichuan. It aims to integrate existing data resources from medical institutions at all levels within the province, as well as from related sectors such as medical insurance, environment, meteorology, and sports, while connecting external data sources including mobile healthcare and wearable devices. The goal is to build a provincial-level proactive health big data support platform with unified service standards. Meanwhile, under the agreement with Wenjiang District, the project will leverage the industrial achievements and experience of the Chengdu Medical City located in the district. By introducing internationally advanced healthcare concepts at the forefront, it seeks to concretely implement the Sichuan Provincial Government’s “Proactive Health” strategy. These two initiatives complement each other in terms of overall planning and practical implementation, ensuring the orderly advancement and profitability of current proactive healthcare development, while also leaving ample room for future industrial growth.
From a technical perspective, the China-US Health Summit boasts substantial accumulation of medical technologies, having not only gathered resources from China’s top-tier medical experts but also mastered a vast array of advanced international patents and theoretical systems. In terms of software, CETC Software & Information Technology Services, backed by China Electronics Technology Group Corporation (CETC), possesses the most advanced information technology in China and a large pool of IT elites. It has taken a leading step in numerous industrial internet sectors, including healthcare, thereby laying a solid foundation for operational services for this project. Regarding industry development, as a key strategic support point and base for China’s future development strategy in the central and western regions, Chengdu’s medical and health services have extended their reach to western areas such as Sichuan, Chongqing, Yunnan, Guizhou, and Tibet. Wenjiang District, undertaking Chengdu’s historical mission to build a western health and leisure industry, has positioned itself at the forefront of the health and wellness sector through the continuous development of the Chengdu International Medical City, seizing the strategic opportunity presented by the “Internet + Healthcare” industry.
“Cash used to be king, but I believe data will reign supreme in the future,” Zhou Huwei told reporters. Future industry, government, and corporate decision-making can all leverage big data to gain insights into user preferences. By anchoring operations in communities and utilizing comprehensive data for strategic response and analysis, health big data platforms can truly deliver value to society.
This collaboration with the Active Health Industry Alliance also aims to build a medical big data platform. By leveraging big data analytics to understand the public’s healthcare needs, we seek to alleviate tensions in doctor-patient relationships. Currently, most medical resources are concentrated in tertiary hospitals (Grade III Class A), yet one-third of their patients suffer from common conditions such as colds and fever, while primary care institutions remain underutilized, resulting in an “inverted pyramid” distribution of medical resources. To transform this “inverted pyramid” into a “standard pyramid,” in addition to the tiered diagnosis and treatment system strongly advocated by the state, big data can be used to analyze which regions require specific types of medical resources.
Therefore, in investing in healthcare startups, Sichuan Railway Investment Information Technology Industry Investment Company focuses more on healthcare big data companies. As the company has just entered the healthcare investment sector, it is actively recruiting investment professionals with expertise in healthcare. "Internet + Healthcare" will be the company’s core focus in the future. Leveraging the advantages of its parent group, the company aims to integrate resources from provincial and municipal governments as well as central state-owned enterprises. With the comprehensive healthcare reform led by the Sichuan Provincial Health and Family Planning Commission gradually unfolding under the guidance of the provincial government’s “Internet+” strategic policy, the convergence of favorable timing, geographic advantages, and human resources positions Tietou Group to make new contributions, together with its partners, to the development of Sichuan’s healthcare sector, economic growth, and improvement in people’s living standards.