Major medical aesthetic beauty giants’ profits collectively decline; some industry tycoons’ net worth is cut in half, shrinking by more than 10 billion (CNY)

Reporter | Around dawn

Editor | Zheng Shifeng Zhang Mingyan

When the tide recedes, you know the quality. In 2025, the beauty-tech (medical aesthetics) industry’s earnings reports collectively bid farewell to the “high-growth myth,” marking the industry’s formal shift from a dividend-driven, barbaric expansion model to a deep adjustment cycle dominated by inventory-based competition and a rebuilding of logic.

According to the latest disclosed performance data, profits across leading companies have shown widespread declines. In the hyaluronic acid sector, Aimeike encountered negative growth in both revenue and net profit for the first time since its listing; its non-recurring profit decreased by more than 40% year over year. Haohai Biological’s net profit fell 40.3% year over year.

The collagen protein track was not spared either. Juzhi Biological recorded a first-ever post-listing decline in both revenue and profit. While Jinzibo Biological saw a slight increase in revenue, it fell into a “growing revenue without growing profit” predicament.

Against this backdrop, the billionaires that the industry once manufactured at scale have generally seen their net worth shrink, as the logic of wealth is undergoing a brutal return from “valuation bubbles” to the “true value of industry.”

Against this backdrop, an underlying logic rebuild for “breaking through” is taking place. On the one hand, medical aesthetics companies are trying to pursue global valuation reshaping by going overseas. On the other hand, some break-through players are shifting from single-component products to “full-scenario solution” approaches—such as Jinzibo Biological achieving coverage across all dosage forms.

More importantly, as compliance red lines tighten, industry entry thresholds are being raised further. The throne of the future no longer belongs to the pure early movers who simply capture dividends, but to marathon runners who can wield research blades and lay out global industry tracks while staying within compliance red lines.

The cycle shockwave has arrived

As major leading manufacturers gradually release their annual performance, the “super high-profit era” of medical aesthetics—once with gross margins comparable to Moutai and revenue growth that routinely doubled—has its demise announced by each set of results showing “growing revenue without growing profit,” or even “double declines in core indicators.”

As the vanguard of the wealth-making movement, the “three medical aesthetics swordsmen” were the first to feel the chill brought by technological equality and inventory-based competition.

Aimeike has encountered the toughest test since its listing. Reportedly, in 2025 the company’s revenue was 2.45 billion yuan, down nearly 19% year over year; attributable net profit was 1.29 billion yuan, down 34.05% year over year.

In its fifth year after listing, Aimeike is seeing the first negative growth in both revenue and net profit. Growth in its core basic-pipeline solutions and gel-type products has clearly stalled. Among them, in 2025, revenue from solution-type injectable products was 1.26 billion yuan, down 27.48% year over year; operating revenue from gel-type injectable products was 890 million yuan, down 26.82% year over year.

Although gross margins for basic-pipeline products are still above 90%, the downward trend in year-over-year figures has not been reversed.

Another hyaluronic acid giant, Haohai Biological, likewise faced pressure. In 2025, revenue was 2.47B yuan, down 8.33% year over year; net profit was 251 million yuan, down 40.3% year over year. Three major segments—medical aesthetics, ophthalmology, and orthopedics—experienced collective strain. Among them, medical aesthetics and wound-care products saw a year-over-year decline of 12.97%.

Worth noting is that from 2021 to 2025, Haohai Biological’s revenue growth rates year over year were 32.61%, 20.56%, 24.59%, 1.64%, and -8.33%, respectively. This shows that in 2024, the company’s revenue growth rate had already slowed significantly, while in 2025 it delivered the worst revenue performance in nearly five years.

As the narrative around hyaluronic acid gradually loses momentum, the two collagen protein heavyweights—once heavily expected and seen as “power-handovers” in reorganization—also hit the ceiling of growth in 2025.

As the first collagen protein stock on the National Equities Exchange and Quotations (NEEQ), Jinzibo Biological saw its first-ever negative growth on the profit side since listing. On one hand, after adjustments to tax policies, the VAT rate for Jinzibo’s relevant medical device products was changed from 3% to 13% starting January 1, 2025.

On the other hand, the share of revenue from functional skincare products has increased, and the gross margin rate for this category is lower than that of its medical device business. With these two factors stacking together, it directly pulls down the overall profitability level.

Seen in the secondary market, after Jinzibo’s stock price set a high above 450 yuan in May 2025, it continued to drift downward. As of April 3, 2026, the company’s shares were down to 177.02 yuan per share, with a market value of 20.37 billion yuan.

Juzhi Biological, the first collagen protein stock on the Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing (HKEX), also saw the same situation. In fiscal year 2025, the company achieved full-year revenue of 5.52B yuan, down slightly 0.4% year over year; net profit was 1.91B yuan, down 7.1% year over year.

Similar to the companies above, this was also the first time since Juzhi Biological’s listing that it saw a dual slowdown in both revenue and profit.

With multiple factors compounding, market confidence in the secondary market has been hit. The market value fell from a peak above HK$90 billion within half a year, shrinking by more than HK$50 billion. As of April 3, Juzhi Biological closed at HK$28.34 per share, with a total market capitalization of HK$30.35 billion.

Under the dual pressure from performance and share prices, this is not only a collective profit slowdown, but also an inevitable bout of pain as the medical aesthetics industry returns from the “valuation myth” to “industry common sense.” At the same time, it also means that once technological parity has leveled the gap of yesterday’s superprofits, the era of “lying back and winning” purely on component dividends has been彻底 ended.

The old king steps down, and the new nobles turn cold

Amid the deep reshaping of valuation logic, the ups and downs of the personal fortunes of the leaders in the medical aesthetics giants have become a direct mirror of the rebuilding of the underlying logic of the “beauty economy.”

Looking back a few years ago, the medical aesthetics track was a super production line that manufactured billionaires. At that time, the component dividend built around hyaluronic acid formed an extremely solid moat, and the capital market awarded medical aesthetics consumables with a very high premium due to their perceived scarcity.

In the early stage, Aimeike—thanks to its ultra-high gross margin rate of over 90%—was dubbed the “medical aesthetics Moutai” by the capital market. From 2011 to 2016, the actual controller, Jian Jun, took charge as chairman.

In 2020, Aimeike successfully listed on the capital market. In the same year, Jian Jun ranked 183rd on the “2020 Forbes China 400 Rich List” with wealth of RMB 20.68 billion. Over the following three years, influenced by the resonance from the sustained improvement in the medical aesthetics track’s market sentiment and Aimeike’s strong performance growth, Jian Jun’s wealth rose in step with market value, achieving a geometric leap.

According to the Hurun Rich List and the Forbes rich list, Jian Jun’s wealth peaked at RMB 52.5 billion in 2023.

During that era of relentless momentum, founders’ fortunes kept climbing, reflecting the early blue-ocean dividend of the industry—almost as if, by holding onto that transparent injectable, one held the scepter to the throne of wealth.

Compared with Jian Jun, although Haohai Biological’s actual controller, Jiang Wei, did not hold posts in the listed company and did not participate in daily operations, Jiang Wei and their spouse together held 45.82% of the shares. Through high-percentage shareholding penetration, they have long maintained absolute control over the company.

Similarly, between 2020 and 2023, according to the Hurun Rich List, Jiang Wei and spouse’s wealth level reached as high as RMB 11 billion.

However, as the hyaluronic acid track entered a valuation repair and industry cooling period, the wealth curve of the company’s actual controllers began to fluctuate downward. After 2023, Jian Jun’s wealth further fell from RMB 27.5 billion in 2024 to RMB 25 billion in 2025.

Jiang Wei and spouse also saw a year-by-year decline; by October 2025 on the Hurun Rich List, it had dropped to RMB 7.5 billion.

However, technological iteration is always faster than capital expectations. The myth-making in medical aesthetics has never stopped.

The cooling of hyaluronic acid has come alongside the rise of collagen protein. On the other end of the flow of wealth, are two new collagen protein upstarts, born regional female tycoons.

With their research-to-application transformation capability for recombinant humanized collagen protein, Yang Xia from Jinzibo Biological and Fan Dai Di from Juzhi Biological made an astonishing leap in wealth in a very short time.

In October 2023, Yang Xia entered the “2023 Hurun China Rich List” with wealth of RMB 5.5 billion.

In less than two and a half years, on the “2026 Hurun Global Self-Made Female Entrepreneurs List,” Yang Xia already ranked 63rd with wealth of RMB 16.5 billion. In fact, on that list, another collagen heavyweight, Fan Dai Di, ranked even higher at 47th with wealth of RMB 21 billion.

It’s just that in the power succession within the medical aesthetics arena, there has never been a truly evergreen throne. As technological parity levels the playing field and equalizes entry barriers, mean reversion and price-war smoke driven by excess capacity are becoming the inevitable storyline that periodically plays out across the track.

In other words, the current collagen protein track is inevitably repeating the valuation-reversion path seen in the hyaluronic acid industry. The volatility and decline in the secondary market and the shrinking personal fortunes of the actual controllers are not unexpected.

A new round of growth logic reconstruction

After bidding farewell to the old era of barbaric wealth-making, the coordinate axis of the capital market is being recalibrated. When the premium for technology is fully diluted by mean reversion, component-based medical aesthetics also says goodbye to its scarcity dividend. Medical aesthetics giants are no longer obsessed with competing over single financial report numbers; instead, they place the deciding factor into three new puzzle pieces: exporting drug and medical devices, cross-track integration, and extreme compliance.

“Seeking new growth opportunities” has become a common consensus among the giants.

In their 2025 financial reports, Juzhi Biological explicitly proposed “bringing growth back to the company in 2026.” This is reflected in two areas: going overseas and obtaining approvals for three categories of drugs and medical devices for上市上市.

2025 has been defined as the first year of Juzhi Biological’s overseas expansion. Reportedly, Juzhi Biological’s products have entered stores in countries such as Singapore, Malaysia, and South Korea, and it also reaches North American online channels. This supports overseas expansion plans across channels, brands, organizations, and the industrial ecosystem circle.

In addition, Juzhi Biological said it aims to “fire the first shot of Juzhi medical aesthetics” by incubating new brands such as Liyan.

Jinzibo Biological moved overseas earlier. Reportedly, the company’s recombinant type III humanized collagen protein lyophilized fiber has been approved for上市 in Malaysia. This marks another landing in Southeast Asia’s core markets for this product after it entered the Vietnam, Philippines, and Thailand markets.

On March 24, Aimeike publicly stated that the company has a full understanding of the industry’s cyclical development. It will accelerate the launch of products in its R&D pipeline, including new products in areas such as weight management and hair health. Meanwhile, it will steadily advance investment and M&A plans, and actively expand new growth opportunities.

Worth noting is that in March 2025, Aimeike released an acquisition announcement for the South Korea REGEN Biotech, Inc. company, bringing the global sales of the company’s core products AestheFill and PowerFill into its scope. As of now, both products have been approved for上市 in 37 and 24 countries and regions worldwide, respectively.

Behind the giants’ overseas expansion is the fact that China’s medical aesthetics companies have begun to engage in close-quarters competition with international giants. The pricing premium that supported this behavior is no longer low-cost. Instead, it is differentiated technologies with independent intellectual property rights. Going overseas, in essence, is a company’s pursuit of international reshaping of its valuation model—offsetting the risks of domestic track over-involution through the depth and breadth of global markets.

Another attempt to break through is to break the constraints of the existing component framework. On January 8, Aimeike announced that its distributed injectable A-type botulinum toxin product had received the “Drug Registration Certificate” approved and issued by the National Medical Products Administration. This is the seventh compliant marketed botulinum toxin product in China.

From the perspective of the industry’s competitive landscape, the early-mover dividend in the market for botulinum toxin has basically been cleared. Aimeike’s core breakthrough logic lies in whether it can validate, by leveraging its large existing customer base and the distribution channels it has cultivated over many years, that it can complete a strategic leap from being a single filler supplier to a provider of “comprehensive full-face solutions” by filling the crucial puzzle piece of botulinum toxin.

For this reason, whether this product can become Aimeike’s new growth engine still carries many uncertainties.

In addition, Jinzibo Biological’s full coverage across dosage forms—solutions, gels, and lyophilized forms—also reflects this defensive expansion.

Haohai Biological’s expansion approach is even more direct. The company said it will focus on acquisition investment opportunities within the industry to continuously expand and improve its product lineup, and integrate the industrial chain. At the same time, it will deepen internal resource allocation to further strengthen integration with acquired companies across all stages including R&D, production, sales, and service.

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