He was able to do research in the lab without distractions, and he was able to walk up to the stage and give a wonderful project presentation; He has the humility of a young scholar, and is more willing to accept new things, and works with tens of millions of Internet celebrities to shoot **, popularizing the skin care effects of plants with Chinese characteristics; He is a Ph.D. in natural medicinal chemistry and pharmacology from Nankai University, a post-95 entrepreneur, and a "mediocre little genius in skin care". He is Li Zhiyang, the founder of Xihai Shiyang Tianjin Biotechnology***.
Interviewing Li Zhiyang is a very pleasant and relaxing thing, which can be said to break the previous perception of the title of "doctor". In addition to his abundant professional abilities, he also has the ability to observe and refine beauty from nature and life, and his sensitivity and strong adaptability are also undoubtedly displayed in him.
Li Zhiyang believes that scholars should help the world. In the summer of 2019, a practical activity made him realize the value of the native plants in the west that can be developed and developed, and with the original purpose of adding value and generating income for farmers in the west, Li Zhiyang turned the wild grass that was once all over the mountains and fields and no one wanted it into a precious skin care raw material in the laboratory.
In three years, Li Zhiyang's team has obtained more than 10 kinds of active ingredients and star products jointly developed and produced by skin care companies, and the sales volume exceeded 100 million yuan on the first day during this year's "Double Eleven" period.
On the day of the interview, we learned the good news that Xihai Shiyang's "Pioneer of Western Native Plant Skin Care Ingredients" project won the gold medal of the 2023 China International College Student Innovation Competition.
Good entrepreneurs have the superpower of convincing themselves that things aren't that hard. Obviously, Li Zhiyang has slowly developed this ability.
The following is Li Zhiyang's entrepreneurial story.
Li Zhiyang's entrepreneurial journey is a bit of an unintentional coincidence.
Influenced by family education, Li Zhiyang has been interested in various drugs since he was a child, and Alexander Fleming is even more familiar with the discovery of penicillin and Tu Youyou's discovery of artemisinin. With such a mood, he chose Nankai University to major in pharmacy, and after graduating with a master's degree, he was sent to Nankai College of Pharmacy for a doctorate.
In 2019, Li Zhiyang, who was still a graduate student in the School of Pharmacy, became acquainted with Zhuang Lang because of Nankai, and that summer, Li Zhiyang participated in the practical research of help work in Zhuang Lang. "What can be planted is worthless, and what is valuable cannot be planted. Due to the special geological landform, the plant resources in Zhuanglang area have two sides: "barren and rich". But a serendipitous discovery opened the door to a new world for Li Zhiyang, who discovered that the withered yellow weeds used by the locals to feed cattle turned out to be a bit like the "mountain gentian", a plant used in the laboratory for drug development.
At the time, I wasn't sure it was a plant, and the labs were usually buying semi-processed products. On the same day, I took a ** and sent it to the tutor for confirmation, and checked the relevant literature before it was finally confirmed. "The laboratory of the School of Pharmacy is looking hard, but no one cares about it in Zhuanglang and is reduced to cattle and sheep feed, the same thing, in different locations, and in different values. "Is there still more valuable but unknown plants growing in Zhuang Lang? With such questions, Li Zhiyang led the team to spend more than one year in Zhuanglang, Gansu Province to conduct field investigations, and finally obtained 208 plant samples. After conducting a series of related experiments on these 208 plant samples, such as cells, animals, and volunteers, they preliminarily determined that the target raw materials that could be developed were more than 10 kinds of plants such as Zhuanglang's mountain gentian grass and Sand Helichrysum.
There are not enough cosmetic raw materials", a news that most people don't pay much attention to, which aroused Li Zhiyang's attention.
All accidents come to an end.
At present, China's skin care products market is facing a new round of consumption upgrading, and the performance of characteristic Chinese plant ingredients in the "effective skin care" track is very eye-catching. How to conduct in-depth research and excavation of plants with Chinese characteristics requires local enterprises to rely on regional preemptiveness and cultural attributes to make more innovations and explorations in scientific research achievements and product quality.
Li Zhiyang learned that although plant raw materials are more and more favored by cosmetic formulators and raw material manufacturers, domestic raw material manufacturers are highly dependent on foreign manufacturers, and lag behind in terms of technology research and development capabilities, testing and inspection systems and cognitive capabilities of the cosmetics industry, resulting in the overall production level of domestic raw material manufacturers lagging behind the international, and restricting the R&D capabilities and product development capabilities of domestic brands in the industrial chain.
He led the team to conduct more than 2,000 efficacy testing experiments and more than 8,000 safety tests on plant samples, and successfully developed 12 key monomers in these western native plants. Studies have found that these plants grown in the Midwest can not only do drug research, but also extract the key components of some plants and can be used in skin care products, such as gentiopicrin can promote collagen synthesis, slow down the aging process and stimulate cell regeneration and repair. It binds to damaged proteins to help repair tissues and improve wrinkles and sagging.
The mountain gentian grass they will acquire, through an exclusive extraction process, the monomer gentian bitter glycoside extracted has a purity of more than 998%。"In the experiment, we have applied the most cutting-edge international technology system, such as the first 3D printing model, AI-assisted screening of "medicine" and other means, in order to ensure that the experiment is true and reliable, all of which have been certified by the international CNAS and reached the official recognition of the level of medicine. "From 2019 to 2023, team members published a number of SCIs and applied for a number of invention patents. Because of its scientific research strength and influence in the field of expertise, many skin care companies come to seek cooperation in functional raw materials.
Since the beginning of the project, in Zhuanglang and other places in Gansu Province, it has helped farmers sell 40,000 kilograms of mountain gentian grass, and has helped farmers generate more than 1,000 yuan in income. The original purpose was achieved, but in Li Zhiyang's view, it was far from enough.
As a practical agricultural assistance project under the leadership of the Party building of the School of Pharmacy of Nankai University, in the first half of this year, Li Zhiyang, as the secretary of the student party branch, reported the results to Wei Zhanling, Secretary of the Party Committee of the School of Pharmacy, and told about his confusion.
Go ahead and start your own business and apply the results you have developed in the lab to more products. Wei Zhanling's words woke up the person in the dream.
With the development of skin care and health industry, the history of concept hype has ended, and the future of the industry should be based on science and practical results, and the core foothold is raw materials. The native plant raw materials in the west are a treasure resource that has yet to be explored. Li Zhiyang clearly realized that it is his mission to develop more valuable results in the laboratory, and then benefit more native plants and more western regions in the western region from point to point, so as to add value and generate income for more farmers. "Realize the replacement of foreign products with domestic skin care raw materials, and let western plants go to the world". Li Zhiyang quietly set a bigger goal in his heart.
Everything is ready, only the east wind is owed.
On May 18, 2023, TFI Higher Education Science and Technology Innovation Park was officially opened. From an innovative "idea" brewing in the laboratory stage, to producing high-quality and low-cost products that meet market demand, and then to establishing a start-up enterprise that can stand on its feet and produce stable output, this is a process of integrating talent, technology, capital and growth. Where does the driving force of innovation and entrepreneurship come from? How can this process take as few detours as possible? For Li Zhiyang and many other scientific research entrepreneurs, this is a crucial issue. TFI Park is positioned as a "source of scientific and technological innovation", "incubator of scientific research achievements" and "gathering area of scientific and technological service resources", with the purpose of helping entrepreneurs solve these problems, so that technology can better create benefits, and let the "idea" of the laboratory become a real productivity.
With the support of the School of Pharmacy of Nankai University, in August 2023, Li Zhiyang established Xihai Shiyang Tianjin Biotechnology *** and officially settled in Tiankaijin South Park, and the company's main business is the research and development and sales of functional raw materials for native plants in the west.
TFI South Park has given us a lot of help, not only enjoying the relevant entrepreneurial policies, but also providing office space for the company in Haitang Zhongchuang Street at this stage. In the starting area of TFI Smart Town, which is close to the Jinnan Campus of Nankai University, enough space has also been reserved for the company to be used as a scientific research laboratory. The Management Committee of Haijiao Park also actively connects with the best investment companies to assist us in solving financing problems. When it comes to the entrepreneurial process, Li Zhiyang has a lot of feelings. The company has signed plant purchase agreements and letters of intent with Gansu Zhuanglang, Lang County and other places, and has established business cooperation with a number of enterprises and scientific research institutes. "In December 2023, the School of Pharmacy of Nankai University, Tiankaijin South Park, Tianhe Pension, and Xihai Shiyang jointly launched a four-party strategic cooperation, focusing on opening up a new track of smart pension and health.
It has been said that entrepreneurs are the loneliest people. Li Zhiyang doesn't think so, because he is accompanied by a group of excellent Nankai partners. As far as the eye can see, the team of Shiyang Biology is full of young and highly educated faces. At present, there are more than 10 team members, with technology research and development department, efficacy verification department, marketing department and other departments. The company's CEO, Zhang Haohao, holds a master's degree in medicinal chemistry from the School of Pharmacy of Nankai University, and he and Li Zhiyang were good brothers in the upper and lower bunks at that time, and now the two are good partners on the road to entrepreneurship. Now they are focusing on the development and application of S. sas. and S. sasylvestris hairy.
The school motto of "fairness, fairness, ability, and rapid change" is a portrayal of many Nankai entrepreneurs such as Li Zhiyang, and the spirit of Nankai will always influence them. The competition of this group of young people will surely achieve the vigorous development of the hot land of Tiankaijin South Park.
Information**丨Haihe Education Park.