Alibaba's Ant Financial plans to expand in digitized healthcare sector

Ant Financial intends to purchase a minority stake in Shanghai-listed Winning Health Technology Group through an investment subsidiary to accelerate the digitization process of health care and medical services.

Winning Health Technology, a health care and health information solution in China, said in a stock exchange listing that it is under discussion for an equity stake transfer to Shanghai Yunxin Venture Capital Management Co of at least 5 percent, which is a subsidiary of Ant Financial.

Winning Health has suspended trading since Monday.

Winning Health and Yunxin Venture Capital said the two parties seek collaboration in the “Internet Plus medical and health care services” sector, but that they still need to work on the details, according to the stock exchange filing.

Health information services have been a major area where Internet giants are seeking various kinds of partnerships to utilize technology and data capability in the restructuring of the existing pharma and medical services sector.

Alibaba’s health care service affiliate AliHealth also inked a framework agreement with Winning Health in 2015 to share resources in areas including medicine distribution and medical insurance risk measurements, as well as integrated online and offline health care service ecosystems.

Winning Health’s profit climbed 30 percent to 213 million yuan (US$36 million) in 2017 and revenue stood at 1.2 billion yuan.

Last week, Tencent said it plans to invest 1.27 billion yuan in Shenzhen-listed DHC Software Co to strengthen partnerships in medical cloud computing services and medical insurance solutions.