The fate of Yitu Medical is finalized, and Shenrui Medical completes the acquisition

Artery Network was informed exclusively that Yitu Medical, the medical section of Yitu Technology, has been merged into Shenrui Medical

Shenrui Medical and Yitu Medical are both medical AI head companies

The merger of two leading medical AI companies will have a huge change in the industry structure

Analysis of the status quo of two medical AI companies

The essence of mergers and acquisitions is the combination of values, but only complementary companies can reap the result of "1+1>2" after the merger

Looking back at the roles played by the two companies in the field of medical AI, there is no shortage of similarities at a glance

Shenrui Medical has three aspects: focusing on products, focusing on scientific research, and focusing on connections

In addition, Shenrui Medical also pays attention to the construction of basic hospital capacity

In contrast, although Yitu Medical also has large-throughput AI products such as lung nodules and pneumonia, according to the survey data after 2019, Yitu Medical after 2019 pays more attention to the development of specialized fields and focuses on surprises.

Distribution of Yitu Medical Products (Statistics from Arterial Network in December 2019)

Secondly, Yitu Medical emphasizes the application of “AI+Big Data”.

Comparing the characteristics of the two companies, the advantages of the merger can be roughly summarized into the following three points:

1.

After the completion of the merger, Yitu Medical’s current products and achievements based on NLP technology in intelligent pre-questioning, intelligent guidance, and intelligent clinical decision-making assistance will be directly added to the current product system of Shenrui Medical, whether it is the direct product The application is still the adaptation and blessing of the underlying technology.

In June 2021, the Medical Device Technology Evaluation Center of the State Drug Administration issued the "Notice on Publicly Soliciting Opinions on the Guiding Principles for Registration and Review of Artificial Intelligence Medical Devices (Draft for Comment)", which detailed the types of artificial intelligence medical devices.

In general, after this integration, Shenrui Medical will greatly expand its reach in the medical AI market, seize more opportunities, and increase its market value

Second, in-depth auxiliary diagnosis scenarios

In addition to the expansion of horizontal scenarios, medical AI companies are also looking for vertical in-depth, digging new growth points in the auxiliary diagnosis AI scenario

At present, Shenrui has the blessing of lung nodules and pneumonia, and it is also on the line in the cardio-cerebrovascular, childhood asthma and other sub-scenarios.

In terms of empowering primary care, Shenrui Medical, the First Affiliated Hospital of Chongqing Medical University, and China Telecom's "Cloud + AI Defeat the'Pandemic'" project won the CHINC 2020 "National Medical Informationization Anti-epidemic and Anti-epidemic Outstanding Case Selection" III Awarded, the project will set up the cloud platform to the cloud, put artificial intelligence, and then dock with the medical consortium information platform
.
At this point, the National Health Commission can cover regional disease control with only a small amount of investment, and realize telemedicine supported by AI
.

Complementing it is Yitu Medical's pre-diagnosis, referral, and auxiliary diagnosis programs
.
To put it simply, in terms of informatization, Yitu Medical starts from serving patients, making it easier for patients to reach medical resources suitable for their needs, while Shenrui Medical starts from serving hospitals to help hospitals allocate medical care in a more detailed and effective manner.
Resources
.
Combining the two, coupled with the company's achievements in auxiliary diagnosis, a complete set of regional smart medical prevention, diagnosis, and smart solutions has become mature
.

3.
Expanding the number of customers

When participating in the 2019 Arterial Network Medical Artificial Intelligence Enterprise Survey, Yitu Medical has revealed that it has landed in nearly 400 hospitals, and Shenrui Medical has gradually gained support from hundreds of hospitals during 4 years of exploration
.
After the merger, firstly, the customer reach of Shenrui Medical will continue to expand, and secondly, after product integration and optimization, the new Shenrui Medical will give doctors a better AI experience
.

After the acquisition, how will the medical artificial intelligence industry change?

In 2020, a total of 24 financings occurred in the imaging AI field, totaling 2.
976 billion yuan, of which 10 financings occurred from five leading companies such as Shenrui Medical, Keya Medical, Shukun Technology, Inference Technology, and Huiyi Huiying.
Received 2.
54 billion yuan of this, accounting for about 85.
35% of the industry’s total financing
.

In 2021, this gathering trend will continue, and new capital, talent, and technology will continue to flow to the head
.
In the end, the high capital investment and high time investment in the field of medical artificial intelligence have built high barriers for leading companies based on core technologies, hospital relationships, and effective data sets, allowing leading companies to build effective competitive advantages
.

Whether this barrier is effective, we can refer to the more mature medical information field
.
Specifically, there are two modes for non-AI companies to enter this track.
The first is to start from the product and explore the sub-scenarios that companies have not touched or touched less.
For example, Hangzhou Zhiwei Information uses bone marrow smears as AI cutting tools.
Entrance; Second, starting from the model, selling new AI-based products to existing customers.
Large companies such as Fujifilm and GE Healthcare generally use this approach
.

The merger of leading companies has its advantages.
Especially at this stage, medical AI companies have gradually become more powerful due to the core technology
.
The development of the commercialization process of AI proves that as long as they can find areas with real clinical needs and provide effective products, there are still plenty of opportunities in this area, and AI start-ups should not be easily discouraged
.

Under the new situation, the different roles of medical AI are affected

The AI ​​medical track is a popular track.
There were many market participants in the early years.
In recent years, a number of participants have been eliminated
.
Since last year, the AI ​​medical track has ushered in the first year of commercialization.
Competition has become increasingly fierce, and industry integration has begun.
Market participants will be further reduced in the fierce competition.
The market share of leading companies will gradually expand.
There are scattered markets.
The tendency to become more concentrated
.

After the completion of the acquisition, the new trend will become more obvious, and different roles will naturally face varying degrees of influence
.

As the direct competition between Shenrui and Yitu, the leading AI medical companies will inevitably bear the brunt, and there is a risk that they will seize market share below expectations
.
However, Shenrui's move has opened a new way for the industry to expand.
As the medical AI industry gradually moves from the primary market to the secondary market, and more relevant information is disclosed, the number of mergers and acquisitions between companies is likely to continue to increase
.
As a competitor, you can also use this method to contend
.

For emerging medical AI start-ups, mining new scenarios through traditional deep learning models can easily be followed by leading companies.
Therefore, breaking away from deep learning and using innovative algorithms to solve practical clinical problems may help the industry create new markets
.
Early tumor screening has been slow to develop due to the limitations of star targets.
As an emerging technology, if artificial intelligence can break the limitations of traditional thinking and take certain risks, it will be able to achieve greater potential
.

For platform builders such as medical device manufacturers and medical examination institutions, the current stage of the medical AI-assisted diagnosis track is not mature enough, and the products are quite limited, making it difficult for platform companies to build ecological advantages through the quantity and quality of their products
.
Now that the track integration is opened, it will accelerate the development of the industry to a certain extent and accelerate the launch of AI products
.
Therefore, the M&A event will help the future development of the platform builder
.

In general, the acquisition of Yitu Medical by Shenrui Medical has opened a new stage for the medical AI industry and has effectively promoted the development of the industry.
However, in the long run, how much market and penetration rate medical AI can achieve, perhaps Time will tell us a clear answer
.