GC-Rise Closes US$15 Million Series B Financing

BEIJING, September 2, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- GC-Rise Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd (Company), a leading pharmaceutical company focused on women and children's healthcare, announced that it has closed a US$15 million Series B round financing by OrbiMed, one of the world's largest healthcare and life sciences-focused investment company.

In conjunction with the financing, Dr. Jonathan Wang, Co-Founder and Senior Managing Director of OrbiMed Asia, joined the GC-Rise Board of Directors.

The financing proceeds will be used to strengthen commercialization capabilities, expand product portfolio and help the Company to develop its online-to-offline (O2O) platform dedicated to women and children's healthcare.

"It's a great honor to obtain the investment from OrbiMed. Its world-class healthcare expertise and experience will help us broaden our product offering and enhance our product pipeline, better fulfill the large unmet market needs and strengthen global partnerships," said Wren Zhang, Chief Executive Officer of GC-Rise. "We have been encouraged by the strong interest from the investor community, which is a validation of our business model. I have no doubt that GC-Rise will achieve its mission to improve women and children's healthcare in China."

"We are thrilled to gain a strong partner in China's women and children's healthcare sector," said Dr. Jonathan Wang. "OrbiMed is committed to use its global healthcare network and resources to help GC-Rise achieve its mission."

The company's cornerstone investor Inventages, a major global healthcare venture capital fund, and another existing investor, Yifang Venture Capital, applauded the move.

"We are very pleased by the addition of OrbiMed to the GC-Rise investor base and the Board. Their experience of building leading healthcare companies in China will be invaluable. We look forward to working together to continue the success of GC-Rise and taking the Company through the next stage of their growth," said Dr. Gunnar Weikert, Managing Director and Chairman of Inventages.

About GC-Rise

GC-Rise, founded in 2008, has seen a rapid growth over the past six years. The Company was listed in the top 50 fast-growing companies in China by Deloitte for two consecutive years in 2011 and 2012 as the only pharmaceutical enterprise to be listed.

With a specific focus and competence on women and children's healthcare, GC-Rise offers partners unique access to this important and fast growing market segment. This comprehensive offering includes helping companies with all components of building a successful presence in China: policy interpretation, public affairs management, local registration, running of clinical trials, pricing, distribution to market promotion, brand-building and patient education.

The Company's 500 strong sales force have a network covering over 1,000 hospitals in China's major cities and distributing products to 10,000 drug stores. With millions of female members online, GC-Rise has kicked off its innovative platform dedicated to women and children's healthcare.

The Chinese women healthcare market is expected to see an annual compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 18.2 percent to hit US$94 billion by 2017, while the CAGR for children's healthcare market is estimated to be 10.1 percent over the same period.

Please log on http://www.gc-rise.com/ to learn more.

About OrbiMed

Established in 1989, OrbiMed manages over US$11 billion assets, including several PE/VC funds, hedge funds and mutual funds. Since the inception of its private equity investment activities in 1993, OrbiMed has invested in over 170 private companies across a wide range of therapeutic categories and developmental stages, over 90 of which have been either listed or acquired. OrbiMed has continued strong performance in public equity as well, with ~27cumulative return in the past 20 years. OrbiMed's investment team includes over 80 experienced professionals with backgrounds in science, medicine, industry, finance and law.

OrbiMed Asia, with offices in Shanghai and Mumbai, manages OrbiMed Asia Partners (OAP), the first pan-Asia healthcare and life sciences-dedicated private equity fund. With over US$500 million under management, OAP has made PE investments in 21 companies. OrbiMed has also invested approximately US$200M in the stocks of public China healthcare companies.

Please log on http://www.orbimed.com/ to learn more.