Hui Huxi Launches World’s First Gamified Smart Breathing Training Device, Files IPO Prospectus
Recently, Huichuangyi Taizhou Medical Technology launched the world’s first gamified smart respiratory training device—Huihuxi. By integrating engaging games with a portable smart spirometer, it provides personalized, enjoyable, and effective training through assessment and exercise for patients and individuals requiring respiratory rehabilitation. In light of this launch, VCBeat (WeChat ID: vcbeat) conducted an exclusive interview with Su Bo, the head of Huihuxi.
Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD)“COPD” (commonly known as chronic bronchitis and emphysema) is a leading cause of death in urban areas of China.BurdenedRanked among the top four. Zhong Nanshan, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and a renowned expert in respiratory diseases, stated that China40among individuals aged above12.5%of male and5.1%of women suffer from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), with a higher prevalence among smokers. The number of people with COPD is approximately4000ten thousand, with approximately ... deaths annually due to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD)10010,000, far exceeding the mortality rates of HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis.
A persistent challenge in the management of chronic diseases is that current treatments can only alleviate symptoms and reduce the incidence of complications, lacking curative solutions. Therefore, early prevention and daily rehabilitation are paramount. Respiratory function typically peaks between the ages of 20 and 30, thereafter declining by 10%–20% per decade. Studies indicate that effective respiratory training can help maintain optimal respiratory function, particularly among sub-healthy white-collar workers and middle-aged to elderly individuals, significantly reducing the risk of respiratory diseases and improving quality of life.
Additionally, patients with respiratory diseases such as asthma can monitor and predict disease progression and guide medication use through breathing training and assessment. Singers, swimmers, and shooters can enhance their respiratory function and improve professional performance through breathing training. Engaging breathing exercises are also highly beneficial for yoga practitioners and individuals seeking weight loss.
Respiratory training offers numerous benefits; however, due to the lack of scientific guidance, accurate assessment, feedback mechanisms, and engaging elements, user engagement remains low. Furthermore, the prevalence of rudimentary and unregulated respiratory training products has resulted in poor adherence, with most individuals who require such training performing it infrequently and abandoning it within a few days.
Hui Huxi was born against this backdrop, aiming to transform the current state of respiratory training for individuals with chronic diseases and the general healthy population.
Addressing market demands and pain points, Huichuangyi Taizhou Medical Technology Co., Ltd. has launched Huihuxi, the world’s first gamified smart respiratory training device. Established in September 2013, the company adheres to the core philosophy of “Serving Primary Care, Serving Individuals” and is primarily engaged in the research and development, manufacturing, and sales of medical products. Its current product portfolio includes Huihuxi, mesh nebulizers for drug delivery, and a range of rapid diagnostic products suitable for primary healthcare settings.
Su Bo, founder of Huichuangyi, graduated from the Clinical Medicine program at the Fourth Military Medical University and is an attending physician in hepatobiliary surgery, with nearly a decade of experience in medical product marketing. Liu Zhigang, R&D Director, holds a master’s degree in Control Engineering from Tsinghua University and has led the development of multiple hospital diagnostic and therapeutic products as well as home-based rehabilitation devices. The core team at Huichuangyi has worked together for over five years and previously served as the largest nationwide distributor for a well-known POCT company in Beijing.
Huihuxi Features Six Key Attributes: Professional Assessment, Simple and Fun, Peak Flow Monitoring, Personalized Settings, Medical-Grade Quality, and Portable Design
Huihuxi trains users’ respiratory intensity, control, and endurance by adjusting breathing force, maintaining force stability, and sustaining exhalation time. In addition to enabling intelligent training, Huihuxi can also assess several key indicators of users’ pulmonary function. It evaluates the likelihood of imminent asthma exacerbations and the effectiveness of medication by measuring peak expiratory flow (the maximum instantaneous flow rate during forced exhalation after a deep inhalation). Furthermore, it assesses improvements in pulmonary function by measuring indicators such as forced vital capacity (FVC), forced expiratory volume in one second (FEV1), and the FEV1/FVC ratio.
Game Interface
To enhance user engagement, Huihuxi not only meets the needs of respiratory training but also incorporates fun games, allowing users to break away from the previously tedious training methods and complete their respiratory exercises while playing. A reporter from VCBeat (WeChat ID: vcbeat) watched the demo video of Huihuxi and confirmed that it indeed integrates popular mobile games, making it highly entertaining.
HyBreath is also made of medical-grade materials, which can be combined with various respiratory therapies without causing side effects. HyBreath provides a butler-style reminder function for daily training, ensuring that no session is missed due to forgetfulness.
There are also similar companies in the market, such as "Huxijia." Huxijia is a chronic respiratory disease management platform that provides users with comprehensive health management services—including testing, analysis, early warning, and follow-up—through its self-developed portable smart lung health monitor, mobile app, and physician services.
Compared with Breathing Home, the greatest advantage of Huihuxi is its engaging nature. By integrating breathing exercises with gaming, users can assess whether their training technique is correct based on their in-game performance. This gamified approach enhances user stickiness, makes breathing exercises easier to adhere to, and ultimately helps users improve their respiratory function through consistent practice.
Another advantage of Huihuxi is its price. Priced at RMB 499, it offers better cost-effectiveness than the Huxijia Lung Health Monitor, which costs RMB 1,980, assuming equivalent accuracy in measurement data.
The role of Huihuxi extends beyond respiratory exercises; it also serves as a communication link between patients, hospitals, and physicians after discharge. It fulfills the hospital’s needs for follow-up, service, and patient education, while simultaneously meeting physicians’ requirements for observation, service delivery, and health management.
Huihuxi provides a community communication platform for patients and physicians. Physicians fulfill post-discharge follow-up requirements on the platform, while patients share their exercise experiences. Huihuxi collects user data through the platform.
Currently, Huihuxi’s profitability relies primarily on product sales. Starting in October, the company has begun offline sales operations. Leveraging the established sales channels from its previous point-of-care testing products, the company projects that by the end of 2017, Huihuxi will serve more than 500 hospital clients, acquire over 100,000 individual users, and retain 20,000 engaged users.
Once the user base reaches a certain scale, Huihuxi will collaborate with pharmaceutical manufacturers to leverage data generated by its hardware devices, thereby creating value. It will gradually establish a comprehensive service system for patients with chronic respiratory diseases, encompassing breathing exercises, nebulized drug delivery, routine laboratory testing, and clinical diagnosis and treatment.
In 2015, the company completed its Series A financing of RMB 10 million from Sinovest Capital. This funding enabled mass production and market promotion of rapid diagnostic products, achieving installations in over 2,500 primary healthcare institutions. It also facilitated hardware development and regulatory approval for subsequent products, including mesh nebulizers, intelligent respiratory trainers, and fluorescence-based rapid diagnostic instruments.
This funding round aims to raise RMB 50 million, which will be allocated to the mass production and market promotion of intelligent respiratory trainers and mesh nebulizers, further market expansion of rapid diagnostic products, market education, publicity, training, and services for primary care clinics, as well as subsequent product development, staffing of the technical team, and routine team building.