Chengdu Taihe Weiye Biotech Secures Nearly RMB 300 Million in Series A+ Funding to Expand Global Leadership in Peptide Drug Core Ingredients

VCBeat has learned exclusively that Chengdu Tachem Co., Ltd. (“Tachem”), a global leader specializing in protected amino acids and peptide drug intermediates, has recently closed its Series A+ financing round of nearly RMB 300 million. The round was led by Citic Securities Investment Co., Ltd. and Maotai Jinshi (Guizhou) Industrial Development Fund Partnership (Limited Partnership), an affiliate of Jinshi Investment. Qiming Venture Partners, HLC, and Jiayuan Capital participated as co-investors, while existing shareholders GL Ventures, Zhongjin Qichen Fund (an affiliate of CICC Capital), and GF Xinde continued their participation.

As a leading enterprise in the market for protected amino acids and peptide drug intermediates, Tachem completed two rounds of financing totaling RMB 500 million in less than six months. This August, Tachem announced the completion of its RMB 200 million Series A financing round.

According to reports, the funds raised in this round of financing will be primarily used to accelerate the commissioning of the company’s 240-mu Phase II plant and the construction of its 500-mu Phase III plant. The company plans to have all three phases of its 1,000-mu manufacturing facility operational by 2025, further meeting the growing global demand for Fmoc-protected amino acids.

Driven by favorable factors such as accelerating population aging, rising prevalence of chronic diseases, shifts in disease spectra, evolution of drug modalities, and the catalytic impact of blockbuster GLP-1 therapies, the global peptide drug market continues to gain momentum. Amidst the surging interest in innovative peptide drug R&D, core upstream raw materials—including protected amino acids, resins, and coupling agents—are experiencing supply shortages against strong demand.

However, existing manufacturers of protected amino acids are generally small, fragmented, and disorganized, lacking both a stable and reliable delivery system and the strategic vision to build globally integrated industry leaders. Many enterprises remain in an early stage of development, characterized by low-end, undifferentiated products and inconsistent quality.

Founded in 2013, Chengdu Tachem Co., Ltd. currently holds comprehensive safety, environmental protection, and regulatory compliance qualifications within the industry. The company also boasts industry-leading capacity expansion rates and a stable, professional R&D and production management team. Its current product portfolio, which includes protected amino acids, non-natural protected amino acids, peptide fragments, amino acid (linker) resins, GLP-1 side chains and their raw materials, among over a thousand other products, is at the forefront of the industry. This has enabled the company to rapidly secure contracts with more than one hundred pharmaceutical companies and CDMO clients worldwide.

According to Frost & Sullivan data, the global market size for peptide drugs is projected to grow from $62.8 billion to $96 billion in 2025, while the domestic market size in China will increase from $8.5 billion in 2020 to $18.2 billion in 2025, indicating significant market potential. Among these, drugs in the GLP-1 metabolic disease sector are experiencing explosive growth, with their market size expected to reach $28.2 billion by 2025.

As the third wave of development sweeps through innovative peptide drugs, the entire peptide-related industry chain is rising with the tide. Following the completion of this round of financing, Chengdu Tachem Co., Ltd. will build on its foundation of efficient, stable, and high-quality large-scale production, while strengthening its R&D and sales capabilities as two key pillars, to establish a comprehensive and well-structured product portfolio. In the future, the company will further consolidate and expand its presence in both domestic and international markets, striving to become a globally integrated enterprise with the largest production capacity and the most diverse product range.

Jinshi Investment“The industrial chain upgrade of innovative drug platforms has long been one of the key themes followed by Jinshi Investment. In recent years, as GLP-1 drugs represented by semaglutide and tirzepatide have demonstrated significant clinical potential, we anticipate that their widespread adoption will bring positive impacts, including the alleviation of various chronic diseases and a reduction in the overall societal healthcare burden. Jinshi Investment continues to focus on products with leading advantages and pioneering teams within this industrial chain. We believe that Mr. Qi and the team at Chengdu Tachem Co., Ltd possess outstanding competitive strengths, contributing to the rapid development of the peptide drug industry.”

Qiming Venture PartnersPartner Chen Kan stated, “The rapid expansion of the peptide drug market has created incremental opportunities for upstream basic raw material suppliers. Chengdu Tachem Co., Ltd. has been deeply engaged for many years in the field of synthetic raw materials such as protected amino acids, continuously refining production processes and focusing on enhancing product quality, thereby establishing a leading domestic supply capability.”

HLCThe project leader stated, “With the rapid development of peptide drugs, Chengdu Tachem Co., Ltd., as a leading upstream raw material supplier, is continuously expanding its product portfolio to better meet the demands of the industry chain. We are honored to serve the corporate team led by Mr. Qi.”

Jiayuan CapitalPartner Hu Yi stated, “Biopharmaceutical investment has now entered the 2.0 era, requiring the identification of niche segments with genuine growth potential and leading enterprises possessing core technologies. We believe that GLP-1 and peptide-based drugs, represented by semaglutide and tirzepatide, constitute such a sector with high-growth potential over the coming years. We are further encouraged to find that Chinese companies are not lagging in the GLP-1 space; indeed, they have already secured a prominent position in the upstream segment of the industry supply chain. Chengdu Tachem Co., Ltd. is one such enterprise. Its protected amino acids, linkers, and other products demonstrate strong industry competitiveness in both quality and cost. We are confident that Tachem will become a world-class supplier of key peptide raw materials in the future.”

GL VenturesThe project leader stated, “Innovative peptide drugs have a broad range of indications and can be applied in the treatment of diabetes, heart failure, chronic kidney disease, and obesity. With a large potential beneficiary population and currently low market penetration, this sector represents a long-term, high-growth opportunity. As a core upstream supplier of peptide raw materials, Chengdu Tachem Co., Ltd. boasts profound R&D expertise and strong team execution capabilities, ensuring downstream customers with a continuous and stable supply of comprehensive, high-quality raw materials. With the commissioning of its new factory, Tachem is poised to become one of the preferred partners for global peptide pharmaceutical companies and CDMOs.”

Zhongjin Qichen Fund“It is stated that, ‘With the disclosure of multiple impressive clinical advances in GLP-1 drugs, peptide therapeutics have entered a phase of rapid development. As a core raw material supplier for peptide drug synthesis, Chengdu Tachem Co., Ltd. has rapidly expanded its layout to enhance supply capacity. We appreciate the team’s professional expertise and strategic vision, and believe the company will continue to explore new frontiers. Zhongjin Qichen Fund has made additional investments in this round to support the company in becoming a leading provider of peptide synthesis raw materials in China.’”

Jinshi Investment Co., Ltd., established in 2007, is a wholly-owned subsidiary of CITIC Securities. Over the past sixteen years, Jinshi Investment has been consecutively ranked first among “Private Equity Subsidiaries of Chinese Securities Firms” and listed among the top ten “Private Equity Investment Institutions in China,” making it one of the most influential private equity investment firms in the country. As a fund manager, Jinshi Investment has maintained an average annual outbound investment scale of RMB 10 billion in recent years, supporting the layout of national strategic emerging industries through equity investments. The Maotai Jinshi (Guizhou) Industrial Development Fund, which participated in this investment in Chengdu Tachem Co., Ltd., serves as a key fund vehicle for the collaboration between Kweichow Moutai Group and CITIC Securities to serve the real economy and promote higher-quality economic development.

GL Ventures is one of China’s most active venture capital platforms, dedicated to identifying and creating value for innovative companies. It focuses on key sectors such as new technologies, new energy, new materials, and new consumption, and is committed to supporting the long-term development of early-stage innovative enterprises through systematic, in-depth value-creation services.

Zhongjin Qichen Fund is a professionally managed, market-oriented equity investment fund under CICC Capital. CICC Capital, the private equity fund management platform of China International Capital Corporation Limited (CICC), oversees CICC’s domestic and overseas private equity fund businesses and has grown into one of China’s leading private equity investment management institutions. Leveraging the ecosystem resources of CICC Capital and CICC, Zhongjin Qichen Fund adheres to an industry research-driven approach, seeks relatively certain investment opportunities in high-growth sectors, strictly follows the logic of value investing amid market fluctuations, and has delivered solid returns to its investors.

Qiming Venture Partners, established in 2006, has successively set up offices in Shanghai, Beijing, Suzhou, Hong Kong, Seattle, Boston, and the San Francisco Bay Area. Currently, Qiming Venture Partners manages 11 U.S. dollar funds and 7 RMB funds, with total assets under management reaching $9.5 billion. Since its inception, the firm has focused on investing in outstanding early-stage and growth-stage companies in the Technology and Consumer (T&C) and Healthcare sectors.

To date, Qiming Venture Partners has invested in more than 530 high-growth innovative enterprises, among which over 200 have achieved exits through listings on exchanges such as the New York Stock Exchange, NASDAQ, the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, the Shanghai Stock Exchange, and the Shenzhen Stock Exchange, as well as through mergers. More than 70 of these portfolio companies have become industry-recognized unicorns and super unicorns.

Serving Chinese-style modernization, HLC is dedicated to discovering and realizing the enduring value of science and technology. Leveraging deep expertise in core disciplines such as chemistry, biology, and materials engineering, and grounded in independent, in-depth research and systematic empowerment services, HLC is committed to creating sustained positive impact on productivity transformation and the enhancement of public health through long-term value investments in the real economy and technological innovation.

To date, HLC has invested in more than 100 high-quality enterprises, including Mindray Medical, United Imaging Healthcare, Yuwell Medical, Tigermed, Baiyang Pharmaceutical, Pharmaron, Borui Biology, Ecolive Biotech, Kaiyin Technology, Jianhui Information, and Babo.

Jiayuan Capital, established in 2015 and headquartered in Shenzhen, is a family office focused on investments in technological innovation and biomedicine. Its management team primarily comprises seasoned professionals with many years of experience at renowned investment firms, investment banks, law firms, and accounting firms.

Jiayuan Capital has cumulatively invested over RMB 1 billion of its own funds in external ventures, directly or indirectly investing in more than 50 companies. Among these, seven have successfully gone public or been acquired, and seven are preparing to file for IPOs. Many of Jiayuan Capital’s portfolio companies have grown into influential leaders in their respective niche sectors. These include Shein, China’s largest cross-border e-commerce unicorn, as well as other standout projects such as Zhixiang Jintai, Yuanhua Intelligence, Baoji Pharmaceutical, Weiai Intelligence, and Nanke New Materials.