HK$138 million: medical beauty giant bets on RNA therapy

September 7, 2025, Sirnaomics-B (2257.HK) announced that it proposed at a price of HK$12 per share, a discount of 19.84% compared to the closing price on September 5, issue approximately 17,352,400 new shares to subscribers such as Bloomage Biotechnology (Hong Kong) Co., Limited, representing 14.16% of the enlarged share capital, raising approximately HK$206 million in net proceeds for general working capital. Among them, Bloomage Biotech, through its wholly-owned subsidiary Bloomage Biotechnology (Hong Kong) Limited, subscribe for 138 million Hong Kong dollars worth of shares, with a shareholding ratio reaching 9.44%.

After the news was disclosed, Sirnaomics' stock price once increased over 10% on the same day. The market has shown strong interest in the trend of medical aesthetics capital crossing over to innovative drug sectors such as RNA therapy. This investment is considered an important strategic move by Bloomage Biotech to expand into the innovative pharmaceuticals field beyond its medical aesthetics business.

Bloomage Biotech (Bloomage Bio, A-share code: 688363.SH) was founded in 2000. As a leader in the global hyaluronic acid (Hyaluronic Acid, HA) industry, Bloomage offers more than 200 product specifications, widely covering multiple fields such as pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, and food. According to the Sullivan report, Bloomage's the global market share of hyaluronic acid raw materials is as high as 44% in 2021, firmly securing the top position in the industry. In its early stages of development, Bloomage Biotech demonstrated strong growth momentum. In 2022, the company's revenue reached 6.359 billion yuan (a year-on-year increase of 28.53%), and the net profit attributable to shareholders was 971 million yuan (a year-on-year increase of 24.11%). The four-wheel drive model consisting of "raw material R&D - medical terminals - functional skincare - functional food" fully displayed synergistic effects.

However, the company's performance has been under pressure since 2023, with revenue dropping to RMB 6.076 billion (a year-on-year decrease of 4.45%) that year. In 2024, it further declined to RMB 5.371 billion (a year-on-year decrease of 11.61%), and in the first half of 2025, revenue was RMB 2.261 billion (a year-on-year decrease of 19.57%). The main reason is the continuous decline in revenue from the largest segment, functional skincare products. Although raw materials and medical terminal businesses have maintained growth, the overall downward trend has not been reversed.

Facing Challenges, Bloomage Biotech has been intensifying its efforts in synthetic biology since 2018, and its international innovation research and development center for synthetic biology entered an efficient operation phase in 2023 with expanding the research and application value of hyaluronic acid in glycobiology and cell biology through synthetic biotechnology.

At the same time, Bloomage Biotech completes 30,000 square meter pilot conversion center in Tianjin, equipped with 64 production lines, focusing on pilot and commercial production of pharmaceutical-grade and skincare-grade active substances driven by synthetic biology, and offering open technology transfer services in a platform-based model. The company relies on HA and polysaccharide material technologies to explore their applications in drug delivery, tissue repair, and other fields. It has been collaborating with Shandong University, Tsinghua University, etc. on industry-university-research cooperation. The research outcomes on bacterial capsule polysaccharides, conducted in collaboration with Shandong University, was published in Science Advances, providing theoretical support for the application of carbohydrate compounds in the biomedical field.

This logic is not an isolated case. Internationally, Allergan has established an advantage in the medical aesthetics field with Botox (botulinum toxin) and was eventually acquired by AbbVie for $63 billion in 2020, becoming part of its biopharmaceutical system. L'Oréal, on the other hand, collaborated with Verily, a health technology company under Alphabet, on "Project Baseline" to explore the mechanisms of aging through skin microbiome data analysis and promote the development of precision skincare solutions.

In China, relying on hyaluronic acid materials, Haohai Biological Technology has expanded to ophthalmic and surgical products. In addition to injectable medical aesthetics products, Imeik (Aimeike) increased investments in research and development of regenerative medicine and peptide drugs, exploring the combination of medical aesthetics and clinical medicine. For both international giants and Chinese enterprises, the boundaries between the beauty industry and pharmaceuticals are becoming increasingly blurred, and cross-border synergy has become a new growth path.

Sirnaomics was founded in Maryland, USA in 2007. Currently, it has dual headquarters established in China and the US and focuses on clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on RNA interference (RNAi) therapies. Dr. Lu Yang, the founder, has nearly three decades of industry experience. Having worked at Novartis' genetic therapy division, Dr. Lu focuses on exploring differentiated approaches for targeted new drugs using RNAi technology. As an RNA therapy company with R&D centers in both China and the U.S., it has built comprehensive R&D capabilities from lab to clinical stages, with its technology and pipeline being representative in the global RNAi field.

Since RNAi technology won the Nobel Prize in 2006 the bottleneck of drugification focuses on the delivery system, which requires addressing siRNA blood stability, targeting of target tissues, and endosomal release. Based on this, Sirnaomics has built three self-developed delivery platforms:

• PNP Platform: Nanoparticles made from histidine/lysine polymers enhance endosomal escape efficiency through protonation and are compatible with multi-target siRNA.

• GalAhead Platform: Innovated on the classic GalNAc technology, comprising mxRNA and muRNA, enabling controllable single/multi-target delivery;

• GalNAc-PDoV Platform: Through peptide docking design, one end is linked to a targeting ligand, and the other end is conjugated with 1-2 siRNAs, balancing efficiency and multi-target loading.

Relying on the technical platform, its core pipeline, STP705 (dual-target TGF-β1/COX-2), has entered the late clinical stage for oncology and fibrosis indications and has received multiple FDA orphan drug designations. In addition, projects such as STP707 (multiple solid tumors) and STP125G (hypercholesterolemia) are at different stages of development.

It is worth mentioning that Sirnaomics also has a presence in the medical aesthetics field. In August 2024, Sirnaomics partnered with healthcare investment firm Gore Range Capital to establish Sagesse Bio, aiming to bring its RNAi therapeutic products to the aesthetic medicine market. Additionally, Sirnaomics initiated a Phase I clinical study for its RNAi therapeutic candidate STP705 for adult abdominal fat reduction and body contouring, demonstrating its strong commitment to research and development in the medical aesthetics field.

This time, Bloomage Biotech injected capital into Sirnaomics with a discount of nearly 20%. On the one hand, it showcases its strategic vision of pursuing a "second growth curve" beyond medical aesthetics; on the other hand, it enters the RNAi precision therapy field through cross-border investment, forming a good complement to its full-chain strategy from raw materials to end products.From the strategic perspective of Bloomage Biotech, the timing and target selection of this investment embody a clear business logic.

First, the medical aesthetics sector is facing a backdrop of peak growth in consumer demand and intensifying homogenization competition. Searching for the "second growth curve" becomes a strategic imperative for major companies. By acquiring shares in biopharmaceutical companies with existing platforms and drugs under development, a preliminary layout can be achieved under a relatively controllable investment scale, which not only retains the possibility of high growth returns but also avoids execution risks associated with large-scale mergers and acquisitions.

Secondly, Sirnaomics is not just “a single drug candidate,” but an R&D-driven company with a delivery platform and multiple pipelines. For Bloomage, whose strengths lie mainly in raw materials, products, and channels, platform-based technologies provide more avenues for synergy than a stand-alone product, for example, future collaborations in drug delivery formats, raw material substitution, or the commercialization of combination therapies.

Finally, the transaction was priced at a discount (around 19.84%), which reflects the reality of short-term stock price volatility while also leaving room for strategic investors to negotiate. For the investee, bringing in a strategic partner with deep industry expertise helps secure tangible support in capacity building, channel development, and regulatory pathways.

That said, any cross-sector investment inevitably comes with a gap between “expectations and reality.” For medical aesthetics companies entering the innovative drug field, the challenges include long-term R&D investment, stringent regulatory requirements, and uncertain technology trajectories, all of which stand in stark contrast to the medical aesthetics industry’s model of rapid replication and short-term cash flow.

Thus, the essence of such a strategic equity investment is securing an “option on future growth” rather than a guarantee of near-term profit. In practice, factors such as shifting regulatory policies, the pace of clinical trial progress, intellectual property ownership and protection, and compliance requirements in cross-border listings will all be critical in determining the realization of investment value. Both the market and industry players need to see clearly both the “strategic promise” and the “R&D reality,” rather than idealizing one side.

The ultimate outcome of this collaboration remains to be tested by time. But it is undeniable that cross-sector partnerships between companies from different fields are opening up new possibilities for the biopharmaceutical industry.

The final results of this collaboration remain to be tested by time, but it is undeniable that cross-border cooperation between companies from different fields is bringing more possibilities for the development of the biopharmaceutical industry.