Produced by | At the forefront of entrepreneurship
Author | Hu Fangjie
Edit | Feng Yu
American Editor | Li Yufei
Audit | Ode
As the first recombinant collagen stock on the Beijing Stock Exchange, Jinbo Biotech is showing a different development atmosphere from the past.
At the end of March, Jinbo Biotech disclosed its 2023 financial report, with annual revenue of 780 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 99.96%, and net profit attributable to the parent company of 300 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 174.61%.
With the rapid growth of performance, the revenue volume of Jinbo Biotech has approached 800 million yuan, getting rid of the situation of hovering around 100 million to 300 million yuan in the past many years, and its development has gradually entered a new stage.
However, compared with the year-on-year growth of more than 100% in the medical aesthetic medical device business, the revenue of the functional skin care products segment, the company's other main business, was less than 100 million yuan, an increase of only 12%.
It's not that Jinbo Biotech can't do a good job in the skin care business, and it's not that it doesn't want to do a good job in the skin care business.
In 2023, the company will enter into a strategic cooperation with the international beauty giant L'Oréal, not only becoming the foundry of its SkinCeuticals brand collagen injection products, but also the core raw material supplier of L'Oréal's core product, Little Honey Pot Second-Generation Cream.
At the same time, in 2023, Jinbo Biotech will continue to expand its skin care business, launch a new brand ProtYouth, and expand the application scenarios of recombinant collagen from face to hair.
Under the frequent layout, why is Jinbo's skin care products business lackluster, and will the in-depth cooperation with L'Oréal Group in injections and skin care products affect Jinbo's own brand business?
1. Wei Yimei is large-scale
Jinbo Biotech's revenue in 2023 will nearly double, mainly due to the rapid growth of its medical device business. Among them, the company's first domestic recombinant type III humanized collagen injection product, Wei Yimei, has made great contributions.
Jinbo Bio's revenue sources include four major segments, medical devices, functional skin care products, raw materials and other businesses. In 2023, the company's medical device business will achieve revenue of 680 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 122.66%, becoming the company's largest business segment.
In the medical device business, the revenue of single-material medical devices dominated by the Weiyimei brand reached 565 million yuan, accounting for more than 72% of the total revenue, and the year-on-year increase was as high as 254.65%.
(Photo / Jinbo Biotech 2023 financial report)
Wei Yimei continued to increase volume, which led to the doubling of the company's performance.
As early as June 29, 2021, the Class III medical device "Recombinant Type III Humanized Collagen Lyophilized Fiber (Wei Yimei)" independently developed by Jinbo Biotech was approved for marketing by the National Medical Products Administration, becoming the only recombinant humanized collagen injection approved in mainland China at that time.
From 2020 to 2022, the revenue of this product will be 0 yuan, 28.4221 million yuan and 117 million yuan respectively, accounting for 0%, 12.18% and 29.87% of the main business income respectively.
In 2022, Weiyimei's revenue will grow rapidly, but due to the low base and limited contribution income, Jinbo Biotech's total annual revenue will be 390 million yuan, which is only a fraction of that of similar companies such as Bloomage Biotech and Juzi Biotech, and it is far from reaching the point of head-to-head confrontation with similar companies in terms of volume.
But that has changed in 2023.
Jinbo Biotech is not only close to 800 million in scale, but also continues to accelerate in terms of growth rate on the basis of 67.15% in 2022. But at the same time, the growth rate of Bloomage Biotech and Juzi Biotech has slowed down.
Jinbo Biotech not only increased its medical device revenue, but also achieved significant growth in its raw material business. In 2023, the company's raw material business revenue will be 24.18 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 42.89%.
However, in the functional skin care products business, Jinbo Biotech's performance has been lackluster.
In 2023, the revenue of functional skin care products will be 76 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 12%, and the growth rate will be at the bottom of the three major business segments.
Is it that Jinbo Biotech can't do skin care products, or does the company not want to make efforts in this business?
In 2023, Jinbo Biotech will reach a strategic cooperation with L'Oréal Group to become the raw material supplier of L'Oréal's skin care business. Jinbo Biotech's raw material R&D advantages have been recognized by international beauty giants, which also proves the value of this advantage in the field of skin care products.
In addition, Jinbo Biotech is also continuously promoting its skin care business, and will launch a new skin care brand, ProtYouth, in 2023.
According to the financial report, ProtYouth products are based on type A recombinant humanized collagen as a single ingredient, and supplement collagen through external application, which has the functions of moisturizing, repairing, soothing, and controlling oil.
Since it has the ability to make skin care products and has ambitions in the field of skin care products, why is the development of Jinbo Bio's skin care products business at the bottom?
2. Difficult skin care business
The development of Jinbo Bio's skin care products business can be described as twists and turns.
From 2020 to 2023, the revenue of its functional skin care products business will be about 54.48 million yuan, 70.24 million yuan, 65.97 million yuan, and 75.93 million yuan respectively.
The growth has not been obvious in the past four years, and in 2022 it even fell by 6% year-on-year, and although it will grow in 2023, the growth rate will only be 12%, which is far lower than the overall growth rate of the company.
The proportion of skin care revenue has been declining, from 33.89% in 2020 to about 10% in 2023.
Specifically, Jinbo Biotech further subdivides its skin care products business into single-ingredient functional skin care products and multi-ingredient functional skin care products. The performance of these two types of products also varies greatly.
In 2023, the revenue of single-ingredient functional skin care products will be 16.51 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 65.33%. The compound ingredient skin care products achieved revenue of 59.42 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of only 2.78%.
Jinbo Biotech said in its financial report that the addition of ProtYouth, a single-ingredient functional skin care product, in mid-June 2023 drove a significant year-on-year increase in the revenue of single-ingredient functional skin care products.
It can be seen that the growth of its skincare business is mainly driven by new brands, and the revenue of the original brands is almost the same as in 2022.
In the past few years, domestic skin care brands have grown rapidly, and companies such as Bloomage Biotech and Juzi Biotech have achieved rapid expansion of revenue scale by virtue of cutting into the outlet of effective skin care, and the overall revenue of the two companies will reach 6.081 billion yuan and 3.524 billion yuan respectively in 2023. In the first half of 2023, Bloomage Biotech's efficacious skin care products revenue accounted for more than 63%, and Giant Biotech's efficacious skin care products accounted for more than 75% of its revenue in 2023.
Jinbo Biotech not only failed to seize the growth opportunity of the functional skin care products business, but also appeared to be quite "chaotic" in the layout of the skin care products business.
First of all, the core and main brands of Jinbo's skin care products business are not clear, and it is difficult to achieve large-scale growth.
The large-scale single product model is a rapid growth path that has been verified by domestic beauty brands, and Jinbo Biotech not only does not have prominent large single products, but also the main skin care brands are also very vague.
(Photo / Photo Network, based on VRF protocol)
In addition to ProtYouth, which will be launched in mid-2023, Jinbo Biotech also has skin care brands such as Chongyuan and Muscle Frequency, focusing on repair, anti-aging and other effects.
In fact, these efficacy demands are the areas where consumer demand is relatively concentrated at present, and relying on Jinbo Biotech's patented ingredient recombinant type III humanized collagen, it can also meet the core needs of the ingredient party. At the same time, it can also further expand the skin care needs of medical beauty users with the help of the popularity of Wei Yimei.
From this point of view, the biggest problem of heavy source and muscle frequency is the lack of brand awareness. In the past few years, Jinbo Biotech has not made good use of the existing skin care brand, but has gone far and launched a new brand, ProtYouth, without the original brand being launched.
Secondly, single-component functional skin care products are not the mainstream of the current functional skin care market, and the practice of some functional skin care brands has also verified that it is difficult to open the market through a single ingredient.
Taking HBN, a cutting-edge domestic anti-aging brand, as an example, as early as 2019, the products launched by HBN were stock solution products aimed at the ingredient party group, emphasizing "single ingredients", including α-arbutin stock solution, resveratrol stock solution, ceramide stock solution, hyaluronic acid stock solution, etc.
(Photo / Photo Network, based on VRF protocol)
However, the response to the stock solution was not satisfactory, and HBN quickly adjusted its direction and realized the transformation from "ingredients" to "efficacy", and gradually opened up the market through "glowing water" with whitening effect, retinol (Aol) essence and night cream with anti-aging effect.
As the market for effective skincare continues to mature, the industry continues to realize the importance of "scientific formulation", including assessing the safety and irritation risks of a single ingredient at high concentrations, and considering the synergy of different ingredients, the balance of safety and sensory aesthetics, so as to achieve the efficacy of the main ingredient, save costs, improve skin feel and enhance the effect.
In this context, the type and concentration of ingredients are often only the first step, and the compatibility between ingredients, production process and technology, transdermal delivery system, overall quality control and other links all comprehensively affect the efficacy and performance of skin care products.
At present, the more successful functional skin care companies, such as Proya, Winona, Bloomage Biotech, etc., have almost no core products that focus on a single active ingredient, and "innovative research + scientific formula" has become an important path for functional skin care brands to open up the market.
Although Jinbo Biotech has more technical barriers in the field of recombinant collagen ingredients, from the perspective of effective skin care business, it is obvious that there is still a question mark over whether the direction of a single ingredient is a good choice.
The choice of different paths in the skincare business will inevitably affect the performance of the company's skincare business.
3. Expensive recombinant collagen "dissuades" delicate girls
"Medical aesthetic companies are now facing greater growth pressure due to the tightening of relevant management policies and increased competition. The outstanding performance of medical aesthetic companies in the field of recombinant collagen in China is due to the rapid development of the functional skin care segment and the low competition of recombinant collagen products. Chen Runxi, an analyst at the Toubao Research Institute, said to "Interface News, Entrepreneurship Frontline".
The potential of the recombinant collagen market has given companies such as Jinbo Biotech the opportunity to grow rapidly. The future of the market is promising, but there are still problems to be solved.
Cost is an issue.
Liu Jiaren, deputy general manager of the R&D Center of Cinda Securities, said in an interview with Times Finance in 2023 that price is an important factor affecting the growth of the recombinant collagen market.
He said that because the industry is in the early stage of development, the production capacity of recombinant collagen in the whole industry is relatively small, including the fermentation process is not yet mature, resulting in relatively high raw material costs, which limits its application in more fields. Taking the price of cosmetic-grade raw materials as an example, the price of one kilogram of cosmetic-grade recombinant collagen is about 100,000 yuan, but one kilogram of cosmetic-grade hyaluronic acid raw materials is about 2,000 yuan.
According to the production capacity data of Bloomage Biotech's annual report and Jinbo Biotech's prospectus, significant differences between the two raw materials can also be seen. In 2022, Bloomage Biotech's hyaluronic acid production capacity will reach 770 tons, while Jinbo Biotech's recombinant type III collagen production capacity will only be 0.117 tons.
(Photo / Jinbo Biotech Prospectus)
The low yield and high cost of recombinant type III humanized collagen may become another shackle that traps Jinbo Biotech from "flying into the homes of ordinary people".
Nowhere is this problem more pronounced in the functional skincare business.
Taking Jinbo Biotech ProtYouth as an example, the price of 30 pieces of collagen disposable stock solution for 25-year-old+ and 35-year-old+ is as high as 1,373 yuan and 2,778 yuan respectively, which are higher than or close to the price of international high-end similar products, and even close to the price of some medical aesthetic injection products.
(Photo / ProtYouth Tmall flagship store)
Compared with similar domestic products, the daily price of 30 pieces of Bloomage Biotech Moist Baiyan Essence is about 360 yuan, and Jinbo Biotech is 4-8 times that of it.
The price of high cost and low brand awareness is also reflected in the sales volume, with the highest sales of Runbaiyan on Tmall exceeding 90,000, while the sales of ProtYouth's products are only more than 500.
(Photo / Runbaiyan Tmall flagship store)
As you can see on the product details page of the Tmall flagship store, ProtYouth Collagen Disposable Stock Solution is a recombinant type III humanized collagen dissolved in sterile water for injection, without any other ingredients. The core ingredient in ProtYouth shampoo and hair care products is type XVII collagen, and hair care products with type XVII collagen are often expected to play a role in slowing down hair loss.
However, the effect of smearing products is very different from that of medical aesthetic injection products with immediate results, and without the comprehensive effect of other ingredients, it is difficult to meet consumer expectations and become a high probability event.
In this context, how many consumers are willing to pay for the price difference by several times?
On e-commerce platforms, there are many consumers who report that the effect of ProtYouth Collagen Disposable Essence is not obvious, such as "after using it for a period of time, there is no obvious feeling", "it feels like a hydration effect", etc.
In addition, as Jinbo Biotech enters the L'Oréal Group's supply chain and becomes a foundry for its injection products and a supplier of skin care raw materials, it will also affect the development of the company's own brand to a certain extent.
"'Recombinant collagen' is another track that international leading beauty companies are betting on, the advantage of domestic brands lies in the advantages of technology and efficacy, and the entry of domestic collagen companies into their supply chain will make domestic brands in the case of insufficient brand power, and the barriers of technology and efficacy are not obvious, which will inevitably have an impact on local companies' own beauty and medical beauty products. Chen Runxi said.
He further said that how to strike a balance between the foundry business and its own brand, first of all, the relevant local enterprises can choose to retain a certain core technology and production control in the foundry cooperation to ensure product quality and uniqueness.
Secondly, local beauty companies can also optimize their own production lines and improve production efficiency and quality control, so as to obtain lower production costs than foreign beauty groups.
Finally, local beauty companies can choose some key products for independent R&D and production on the basis of their own brands, so as to increase the differentiation and competitiveness of their brands.
At present, the competition in the recombinant collagen market has not yet entered the white-hot stage, and there is still market space to expand. In the future, with the intensification of market competition, how to face the peer competition of cooperative enterprises will also be a realistic problem.
*Note: The title image in the article is from the photo network and is based on the VRF protocol.