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QinBaoBao has recently completed hundreds of millions of Series C financing from lead-investor TAL, and co-investors Fosun and Shun Wei Capital. Founder and CEO Feng Peihua said that this round of financing will be used for product creation and brand development. Previously, the company had received an angel round investment from Sinovation Ventures, USD 5 million Series A from Shun Wei Capital, and tens of millions of dollars Series B from Fosun.
The app was launched in 2013 and mainly serves pregnant mothers and families with children between zero and six. The app allows users to upload their baby and family photos and provides scientific knowledge of parenting. The app provides a private family storage space and allows multiple user access. Users can upload baby photos, videos, vaccinations, memorabilia, etc. to keep a memory of their children. The app also provides useful content such as baby recipes, audiobooks, and forums to help users better raise their children.
According to the information provided by the team, the number of registered users of QBB has exceeded 70 million, and the penetration rate of the newborn market has increased continuously year on year. The penetration rate in 2016 was 8.5%, rising to 11% in 2017 and over 20% in 2018. QBB has gained its customers through popular Chinese variety shows. Feng said that in addition to the newborn market, the existing user penetration rate has a growth potential of more than 2 times of the current number of users.
QBB built a variety of comprehensive services such as community forums, e-commerce, and parenting education. QBB has launched their own e-commerce platforms this year to provide high quality and cost-effective infancy products through OEM and the product categories include children’s wear, baby bottles, toys, maternity, diapers, etc. Currently, the platform does not sell food products.
Maternal e-commerce has been a red ocean with platforms like Mia, BeiBei, and industry leaders like JD and Alibaba. However, Feng believes in word of mouth and that having a good brand recognition will make QinBaoBao stand out.
At present, its profit model has three main directions: advertising which has already brought them millions of revenues every month. Although the e-commerce platform has only operated for a year, it is doing well, selling more than 300,000 diapers in a few months. The third income source will be in education on parenting and picture books. These three are billion dollar markets. Currently, the first two business models have been relatively mature, and education is now the focus of the company after the current round of financing.
Feng said that QBB has a good talent reserve. The team includes psychologists, early education personnel, nutrition experts and obstetrics and gynaecologists, establishing a scientific blueprint for children development. Future products will integrate technology to assist childcare providers.
According to reports, QinBaoBao has their own big data and AI technical team, responsible for making products more intelligent. For example, the app is able to provide a personalised recommendation on products and content according to the different needs of users. The also app utilised artificial intelligence to understand the demands of their customers.
Wu Ying, president of TAL Education, said that investing in QinBaoBao will help them to understand the field of early childhood education and better improve educational services and products of Pre-K children. In the future, both parties will be sharing resources and content on education and family online.
QBB has a daily active member of 7 million to date, with mothers accounting for 53%. The number of photos uploaded by users on the platform is nearly 3 million per day. The total number of photos exceeds 3.5 billion, and the total video length exceeds 1.6 billion minutes.
QBB has a total of 230 people and is headquartered in Hangzhou. The technical team is from software company ArcSoft. Founder and CEO Feng graduated from Zhejiang University of Technology and Zhejiang University and was the former VP of ArcSoft product division. He has more than 10 years of experience in software R&D and management, and has led more than 20 product development projects.