Chapter 28 3. Healthcare Industry——Farewell to the good times

When everyone is envious of the strong advantages of the medical industry, a pressure from the outside is quietly approaching China's medical care industry, casting a shadow over its seemingly carefree and bright future. There was a lingering haze. Topic introduction: The biggest beneficiary of economic growth—— Farewell to the good times Today, most of us have to admit this fact. If we don't have luxury cars, DVD players, computers, and stereos, none of these will affect our survival. However, there are a few industries that are closely related to our lives, and the health care industry is one of them. One.

Compared with other industries, the advantages of the healthcare industry are obvious to all.Especially in China's special social environment, the health care industry has access licenses that are difficult for ordinary investors, which has resulted in the monopoly of many fields in the health care industry by a very small number of fixed operators Most of the operators' capital comes from the state. Under such circumstances, the phenomenon of price competition seldom occurs. As a result, the health care industry, including hospitals, can often appear as a monopoly, with extremely high profitability and strong freedom. Cash flow and return on capital, and the existence of this is the reason for the current high medical expenses in China.

In addition to the unique living environment, if we look back at the past ten years, we will find such an amazing fact: In an environment of economic growth, the healthcare industry is one of the few biggest beneficiaries! We can prove the correctness of this point from the data. In the past ten years, the consumption of health care by Chinese residents has increased dramatically from 9% of the total economic output to more than 15%.While this rate of growth is not statistically fast, if we take a closer look it is clearly overwhelming compared to the economic growth rate of 7% per year. In addition to these two points, the stable demand of consumers has also become one of the foundations to ensure the stable development of the healthcare industry.

No matter what time of day, no matter the economic downturn or boom, no matter how people's income fluctuates, one fact will never change - people will always get sick, people will always need doctors and hospitals, and it is This kind of basic physiological needs ensures that the healthcare industry has the most stable customer base. In this regard, its advantages are almost unmatched by other industries. The most important point is that compared with other industries, one of the characteristics of the healthcare industry has made it almost unmatched by other industries since its formation.

This is the unique consumer nature of the healthcare industry! To put it simply, when we decide to buy a computer or a set of clothes, we often choose products that suit us according to our own wishes and consumption capabilities. The initiative is in our own hands. The healthcare industry is completely different. When we go to the hospital to receive medical services, most of us cannot write prescriptions and decide what products to consume in this industry. Those who have the right to make such decisions People, they are practitioners in this industry! Due to the existence of the above points, the development prospects of China's healthcare industry are determined to a large extent in their own hands. Whether it is future competitors from outside the industry or consumers who constitute a buyer's market, they are very important. Difficult to impact existing healthcare companies.

However, as the saying goes: if you gain something, you will lose something. When everyone is envious of the strong advantages of the medical industry, a pressure from the outside is quietly approaching China's medical care industry. The outlook is covered with a lingering haze. In fact, when our medical and health expenditures become the third largest consumer expenditure after food and education, this huge cake that contains unlimited benefits cannot but arouse investors' covetousness. For China's healthcare industry, 2008 is destined to be an extremely critical year. In the spring of this year, several well-known venture capital institutions in the world all set their sights on the Chinese market.

Different from the past, in the past ten years, foreign capital's wrestling with this market has mainly focused on selling their own products to Chinese people. However, we know that under the constraints of external conditions, this kind of "piecemeal" trading, It is absolutely impossible to obtain greater profits. In addition, in the past two years, the development speed of the global medical care market, especially the European and American markets, has begun to slow down. Due to the long-term construction of public welfare in developed countries, the profit margin of this industry in foreign countries has become increasingly meager. Under such conditions, it is naturally extremely difficult for enterprises to survive.

Based on the above reasons, many international investors interested in this business, as well as large multinational companies in this industry, have all accelerated the implementation of their globalization strategies. As a big country with an underdeveloped healthcare system, China’s vast The market share is shining like gold. For international investors holding a large amount of capital, there will be a large number of investment opportunities in sub-sectors such as medical testing, biomedicine, and medical services in the future. The rapid growth of China's GDP will inevitably drive the growth of medical consumption, and China's aging The society is getting worse and worse, and the overall demand for medical services is increasing.At the same time, with the acceleration of urbanization, the huge rural population in China is bound to be gradually included in the urban ecosystem, which will also promote the development of the medical industry.

In view of such facts, some people in the industry even commented pessimistically: This is another Opium War in Chinese history, but the weapons have changed from guns to capital, and the products have changed from opium to medical products. All take away excess profits. These words are full of helplessness and bitterness. We can see that, no matter in terms of technical strength, clear strategic conception, or financial perspective, few of the current Chinese healthcare companies have international competitiveness. powerful individual.And that means, when our government deregulates this field, the good times for China's healthcare industry are over.

In fact, this change is happening. After three years of deliberation and debate, China's new health care reform plan was finally officially announced on April 6, 2009.This "life industry", which is closely related to the livelihood of 1.3 billion people, is drawing an unprecedented change under the impetus of the new medical reform. As far as the large economic system is concerned, China’s reforms are to a large extent forced by the situation. This is the basic experience we have learned in the past few decades. When an industry can easily achieve high-speed growth, there is no need to When it takes effort to achieve huge profits, it means that the crisis is approaching.In the next 10 years, no matter how fierce the fight and competition will be in the healthcare industry, one predictable fact is that the people will really benefit from it, and this is the most important point.