The investment outlet of beauty raw materials "can only go up". Although the mature raw materials are overvalued, there is still concern value in this field, and raw material innovation and transformation profit are the highlands to be tapped.
Reporter | Xie Chuchu
Figure source | Figure worm creativity
In the past year, where did the hot money in the beauty industry flock to? The answer is raw materials. According to the statistics of the future, in 2023, there were 27 financing related to beauty raw materials, which exceeded the sum of skin care, make-up and personal care, and medical beauty services.
Two years ago, thanks to the rapid development of online consumption, a number of cutting-edge beauty brands were favored by capital. Now it is the turn of upstream raw material suppliers to be valued, and there are investors’ withdrawal worries behind it: upstream enterprises are more likely to go public than consumer brands. Some investors even want to go upstream as much as possible, for example, starting from the laboratory side of raw materials. In addition, there is also industrial capital in the investment of beauty raw materials, and they hope to develop unique raw materials to support the terminal through deep binding with raw material suppliers.
Li Tao, executive director of Sunshine Ronghui Capital Consumption Fund, also paid attention to several raw material ingredients in 2023, but after several hesitations, he didn’t take the shot. The reason for waiting and seeing was that "the valuation was a bit high". For the trend of this field in 2024, Li Tao judged that the heat will not be as good as before, because many raw material companies have achieved financing and overvaluation, and it takes time to cultivate and digest raw materials in the market.
Xue Feng, president of Shanghai Jinpu Yuwen Investment Management Co., Ltd. believes that the investment outlet of beauty raw materials "can only go up". Although the mature raw materials are overvalued, there is still concern value in this field, and raw material innovation and transformation profit are the highlands to be tapped.
Hot track
Twenty-seven raw material enterprises, including Shenzhen Haichuang Bio, Qingdao Zhongke Lanzhi, Shanghai Yiru Bio, Shanghai Guangyue Bio, Wuhan Hesheng Technology, Jiangsu Shenghe Wanwu, Yuanyi Bio and Jiangsu Chuangjian Medical, received financing in 2023, and the investors behind them included Lenovo Capital, Softbank China, Zijin Port Capital and Hongbo Capital.
In Xue Feng’s view, it is the general trend that raw materials receive much attention. From the global experience, the rapid growth of international brands has largely benefited from the application of core components, such as the 377 (phenylethyl resorcinol) of Dr. Johnson Chengye, the boson of L ‘Oré al Group, etc. Large multinational groups have always attached great importance to the investment and acquisition of upstream core components. The same is true in China. In 2020, the implementation of the new regulations on the supervision and administration of cosmetics promoted the rapid development of functional ingredients, and domestic head enterprises and cutting-edge high-end brands also actively integrated the supply chain. For example, the revenue of Freda was driven by hyaluronic acid, which increased rapidly from 200 million yuan to more than 2 billion in five years. Bettini’s development of traditional herbal ingredients has gradually made it a scientific and technological beauty brand with national characteristics.
Most of the above-mentioned more than 20 financing enterprises are synthetic bio-companies, one of which is to break through the limitations of the original biological raw materials, improve production efficiency and reduce costs by technology. At present, the raw materials for synthetic cosmetics include hyaluronic acid, collagen, astaxanthin, ergothionine, carnosine, sialic acid, arbutin, squalene and so on.
Recombinant collagen and peptides are the components that attract much attention in 2023.
After being led by Shiseido in 2022, Chuangjian Medical was jointly led by LCatterton, a consumer investment fund under LVMH Group, and CITIC Lyon Capital in September 2023, with the financing amount exceeding 200 million yuan. The company is mainly engaged in recombinant collagen, and started listing counseling in January 2024.
In July 2023, Jinbo Bio was listed on the North Stock Exchange, becoming the first recombinant collagen company to land in A shares.
In the previous month, Pai Peptide Bio, which has attracted much attention in the industry, disclosed the prospectus in Shenzhen Stock Exchange and opened the way to listing. This enterprise is a state-level high-tech enterprise focusing on the research and development and production of polypeptide products, and it is also the only state-level "specialized and innovative" small giant polypeptide production enterprise, and has cooperation with local cosmetics enterprises such as Polaiya, Huaxi Bio and Marubi.
Investment considerations
The head of the investment department of a domestic head skin care enterprise said that last year, the department was also concerned about the investment opportunities of raw materials, covering peptides, collagen, ceramides, sunscreens and other fields. The reason is that in recent years, consumers pay more attention to the efficacy selling point, and brand enterprises also hope to deeply bind with innovative supply chain enterprises in the upstream to jointly develop or directionally make some unique raw materials, so that "the logic of two-way cooperation between business and capital is relatively smooth". At present, his department is following up several targets and plans to participate in investment by direct investment.
In addition, he also mentioned that it is more difficult for consumer companies to go public at present, but upstream companies are currently listed.
In January, 2024, after seven years’ long waiting for listing, Mao Geping, a well-known cosmetics brand, voluntarily withdrew its application for listing and distribution, and the listing of "The First Share of A-share Domestic Cosmetics" came to an end temporarily.
Li Tao also believes that raw material companies have certain scientific and technological attributes and have the possibility of listing. Therefore, last year, he also paid attention to peptides, ergothionine, plant extracts, etc. However, due to the high valuation of the company, they did not make a move in the end.
Shanghai Jinpu Kunwen Investment Management Co., Ltd. has been paying attention to innovative raw materials with practical effects on health and beauty. The underlying logic is to find raw materials with high price, high gross profit and high added value, which have the characteristics of wide application and large market, including the raw materials related to transdermal absorption technology, the extraction of characteristic plants and the innovation of raw materials by modification technology platform.
Like Li Tao, Xue Feng also looked at many popular cosmetic raw materials on the market last year, such as Shenzhen Weiqi Technology Co., Ltd., which makes peptides, but the valuation of such enterprises is too high to invest. Last year, he finally invested in two different companies, one is Eutectic Technology, which is characterized by innovative improvement of existing raw materials, such as solving the pain points of curcumin, hydroxytyrosol and so on; The other is Chapter 14 of the brand, which is characterized by drawing lessons from the ideas and logic of new drug research and development, applying computer technology to the excavation of key targets, designing new functional compounds and screening high-performance active products.
In Xue Feng’s view, the new research and development of raw materials takes a long time, even without income for several years, and the cost will be cheaper if the raw materials are improved, the experimental verification time of effectiveness will be shortened, and the overall business cycle will be shortened.
Can the tuyere continue?
Li Tao will not invest in raw materials unless the performance of raw materials companies is improved this year. He predicted that it would take several years for the raw materials to be digested by the product side, thus contributing to the performance. In addition, the listing failure of peptide bio, which attracted much attention last year, also made the investment in raw materials more uncertain. "It was a good signal," Li Tao said.
In June, 2023, Pai Peptide Bio, the raw material supplier of "beauty peptide" with the largest market share in China, attacked the IPO, and in December, 2023, it applied to withdraw the application documents for listing.
Despite this, Xue Feng believes that the popularity of beauty raw materials will continue in 2024, "only in this direction." Last year, a consumer brand invested by Xue Feng realized a profit of 150 million yuan, but it still failed to go on the market, so it had to move its business closer to new materials and raw materials. These days, Xue Feng is visiting a polypeptide-related enterprise in Jinan, which is still in the laboratory research and development stage.
In Xue Feng’s view, a large number of investment institutions have turned their attention to the upstream raw material industry, which has also caused a certain degree of valuation bubble. However, he believes that the innovation of raw materials lies not only in the original development, but also in the innovative transformation and utilization of the original raw materials, which is also worthy of the attention of enterprises and investors.
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Original title: "Beauty money rushes to raw materials"
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