5Y News | 5Y Capital Portfolio Company "Zhongke Guosheng" Closes Nearly RMB 100 Million Pre-A Round
Accelerate the development of China's bio-based materials industry.
Zhongke Guosheng (中科国生) has officially announced the completion of a nearly RMB 100 million Pre-A funding round, led by Legend Capital, with JunSheng Investment and Eastern Bell Capital participating. The deal closed in early August this year, with Tansuo Capital serving as the exclusive financial advisor. The proceeds will primarily fund capacity scaling of its core pipeline products — 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF), 2,5-furandicarboxylic acid (FDCA), and 2,5-tetrahydrofurandimethanol (THFDM) — as well as continued development of downstream derivatives.
Founded in 2021, Zhongke Guosheng is a bio-based materials R&D company with a vision to "change lives through biomass" and a mission to build out the bio-based materials value chain. Its founding team are all alumni of the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, bringing nearly two decades of research expertise and industrial experience in biomass catalytic conversion and furan-based materials design and development. The company has already built out a complete R&D team spanning biomass to derivatives to polymers, ensuring both cutting-edge product development and end-product commercial viability. 5Y Capital led its angel round.
According to Dr. Yu Zhang, CEO of Zhongke Guosheng, the company has made advancing a "dual-track, two-wheel drive" development model a key strategic priority. On one track, the company has fully solved the cost and feedstock sourcing challenges for HMF. Its proprietary continuous production method has substantially reduced manufacturing costs while effectively improving production efficiency. Having validated multi-dimensional cost-reduction measures — from extracting non-food feedstocks to iterative production process improvements to capacity expansion planning — the company expects to bring HMF production costs below RMB 10,000 per ton within three years. Meanwhile, it has built a portfolio of over 20 high-value-added monomers and is simultaneously advancing validation of each monomer's end-market applications. PEF, bio-based surfactants, and bio-based aramid fibers have already yielded functional improvement data, and the company will continue pushing validation in niche application areas to accelerate broad market adoption. Zhongke Guosheng has also jointly established a venture called "Xinsheng Materials" (新生泰材料) with XtalPi, the AI drug discovery unicorn, focused on leveraging AI to accelerate derivative reverse-design and improve downstream derivative development efficiency, enabling faster and more precise market development.
On the other track, the company has made significant progress in the design, R&D, and industrialization of degradable new materials. Its other major pipeline product, the novel degradable plastic PEOX, has completed 150L pilot-scale production and passed end-market validation, with performance metrics comparable to PGA. At scale, the end-product price will be approximately RMB 10,000 per ton. Given the product's special performance characteristics and policy tailwinds, multiple industry-leading enterprises are in discussions with the company about signing exclusive offtake agreements, with applications targeted at agricultural mulch films, plastic bags, straws, food containers, and other single-use packaging.
On the industrial chain layout front, the company has completed market demand-oriented production line planning. Following the completion of China's first ton-scale FDCA order delivery in May this year, it has since delivered multiple additional ton-scale FDCA orders. Other core monomers including HMF and THFDM have achieved scaled, stable commercial supply with gradually increasing sales volumes. According to Dr. Zhang, the company's Lishui pilot base has been operating at full capacity. On July 30 this year, the company held a groundbreaking ceremony for a thousand-ton-scale production line in Taixing, Jiangsu, with expected commissioning in 2023. Upon completion, this will be the world's first demonstration production base covering the full HMF value chain from feedstock to platform chemical to derivatives to end-use polyesters.
With the announcement of the "dual carbon" strategic goals in 2020 and the growing scarcity of petroleum-based materials, the substitution of bio-based materials for petroleum-based ones will inevitably become a major trend. As a domestic technology-leading, hardcore bio-based materials R&D company, Zhongke Guosheng will continue to strengthen its technology reserves in the bio-based materials field, accelerate breakthrough innovations, and push China's bio-based materials industry to new heights.
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