Tubatu, China's No.1 online home renovation platform may seek listing in Hong Kong soon upon Qeeka Home's IPO

Having passed the hearing of the HKEX on 15 June, Qeeka Home will be officially listed in the Hong Kong capital market next month at the earli-est. Market news indicates that Tubatu intends to seek IPO on the HKEX soon. In just a few months, the two industrial leaders in China's online home renovation market are seeking listings in Hong Kong where the two giants will compete directly in the capital market.

According to the industrial statistics from various third parties, for in-stance, the "2018 China Household and Health Consumption White Pa-per" by ebrun.com suggests that in terms of online home renovation, a sector developing with strong momentum in China's enormous home renovation market, Tubatu has the largest user base followed by Qeeka Home. According to statistics from Analysys.com, a consultant providing big data analysis, Tubatu and Qeeka Home ranked first and second re-spectively in terms of market share. While Qeeka Home started its busi-ness on the basis of home expo and collective purchase of construction materials and subsequently made a move to the internet interior design and construction sector, Tubatu was born with internet development gene from the very beginning.

Since 2008 till now, Tubatu has been committed to building its platform model, from an information service platform to trading service platform in the early phase and has evolved into today's empowerment plat-form.

In the information service platform stage, Tubatu bridge the information gap by matching trades. With the launch of Yun Kou Bei evalua-tion system, Tubatu revolutionized the traditional marketing and client acquisition method of interior design and construction companies as well as ways to find renovation companies for property owners. "Zhuang Xiu Bao" marks another milestone made by Tubatu, upon which Tubatu partnered with third party financial institutions to launch supply chain financing services in order to resolve the cash flow prob-lems encountered in the operation of renovation companies.

At present, Tubatu plays an empowerment role. On one hand, it contin-uously improves users' decision making scenarios and trading scenari-os through renovation Q&A, renovation tips and renovation insurance products etc., so as to offer users a sense of trust and security in their renovation process; on the other hand, through big data analysis, Tuba-tu accurately matches property owners with 80,000 quality renovation companies and assists renovation companies in implementing accurate marketing strategy. Meanwhile, the establishment of Yun Kou Bei eval-uation system enables renovation companies to accumulate reputation and to make breakthroughs with their reputation while further lowering their costs in client acquisition.

Is Tubatu, the online home renovation platform with the largest user base and market share and valued at over US$2bn in its C round financ-ing, a much better investment target?

Home renovation market in China, a RMB4 trillion (USD620 billion) blue sea

There is no giants in home renovation industry.

According to the official data of China Building Decoration Decorate As-sociation (CBDDA), China's construction and decoration industry amounted to 3 trillion in total in 2014, with nearly 150,000 participants. In 2015, with the expansion of the "new middle class", the total scale of the home renovation industry had exceeded trillion.

However, in such a typically "scattered" market, hundreds of thousands of small and medium-sized renovation companies and construction teams, which are the main force providing home decoration services, competing for that multi trillion Renminbi market. According to the data of CBDDA , there were approximately 132,000 companies in the con-struction, decoration and renovation industry in 2016, and Dong Yi Ri Sheng, an established company in traditional renovation market, rec-orded an operating revenue of approximately RMB3 billion in 2016, ac-counting for only 0.2% of the entire domestic renovation market.

In face of the scattered industrial landscape, it is easy to understand why BAT, though launched business covering almost all aspects of our daily life in the past decade, still hesitates to get a toehold in the interior ren-ovation field.

Currently, the growth in the online home renovation market is accelerat-ing. Its expansion is not only facilitated by the current new renovation market volume, but is also driven by second renovation and even reno-vation for rented houses. According to the Frost & Sullivan Report, it is expected that in the next four years the CAGR of China's online home renovation market will reach 58.4% and the penetration rate of internet domestic renovation in the entire home renovation industry can reach 38.1%.

Throughout the development of internet, Tencent and Baidu dominated the market, but now Alibaba and JD.com are taking the lead. As the whirlwind storming from "light model" to "heavy industry", online home design and construction market will embrace a blossom since 2018.

The internet dividend benefits the home renovation industry in the year 2015 which marks the "birth of internet home renovation" market. Yet, it is also regarded as the watershed for the industry. According to the data from iResearch, the fund raising projects in the internet home reno-vation industry in 2015 increased to 123 from 41 in the prior year. The self-operation model ushered in by iKongjian has become a new fashion followed by a flock of internet home renovation companies. However, in the end of 2015, only half of over 200 internet home renovation plat-forms survived.

The growing pains last. In 2017, there were only 19 fund raising projects launched by internet home renovation platforms, accounting for just one-fifteen of that in 2015. Nevertheless, the market has been growing bigger and bigger under the combined effect of political policy sup-ports and rising market demand. Many enterprises, in the mean time, stand out in industry reshuffle, such as Tubatu and Qeeka Home, enjoy-ing another wave of internet dividend in the industry. .

Industry transformation in 3620 days by Tubatu

Reviewing the development progress of the home renovation industry, the history of Tubatu reflects how the internet has been influencing and revolutionizing home renovation industry.

In its progress of becoming a nationwide online one-stop home renova-tion platform, first of its kind, Tubatu has undergone three major trans-formations, from matching information to trades, from building mutual trust to supervising the use of fund subsequently (including quality in-spection and supervision services), from focusing on product manage-ment service of supply chain to providing one-stop interior design and construction services. Tubatu provides solutions to all demands related to home renovation.

Tubatu, in the beginning, tried to improve how the industry connects, in order to re-balance the information asymmetry. At that time, Tubatu was very similar to 58.com, a information sharing website. Tubatu was the first company that rolled out the platform model, establishing Yun Kou Bei based on trade matching services. By breaching the information gap, the original method of marketing and client acquisition of renova-tion companies and the traditional ways of property owners to find renovation companies thus transformed.

In 2012, the launch of "Zhuang Xiu Bao" is the second milestone achieved by Tubatu, the Alibaba of the home renovation industry. Zhuang Xiu Bao also earned the name of "Alipay-like system for Home Renovation Sector", on which users can entrust their funds and Tubatu will transfer the money to renovation companies batch-by-batch based on the construction progress. After solving the safety issue of renova-tion funds, Tubatu partnered with third party financial institutions to launch supply chain finance, such as financial loan products, renovation loan products at consumption end and insurance extension products co-launched with insurance companies, so as to resolve the cash flow prob-lems encountered in the operation of renovation companies.

Tubatu now serves as the infrastructure service provider of the industry, and supply chain-related services have also evolved at this stage. On one hand, it continuously improves users' decision making scenarios and trading scenarios through renovation Q&A, renovation tips, renova-tion insurance products etc., so as to offer users a sense of trust and se-curity in their renovation process; on the other hand, through big data analysis, Tubatu accurately matches property owners with 80,000 quality renovation companies and assists renovation companies in implement-ing accurate marketing strategy.

From this perspective, Tubatu is more than a data platform but a Tecent-like open platform on which both upstream and downstream partici-pants are able to integrate and achieve win-win situation.

That is how Tubatu differs from other internet home renovation plat-forms. When other interior renovation industry participants are still op-erating in form of direct-sale stores, Tubatu is ready to develop from a whole industrial chain angle to establish infrastructure for the home ren-ovation industry.

Tubatu defines future and transformation

The development of mobile internet has redefined many industries in more than a decade. Information asymmetry and unsatisfactory services are regarded as "growing pains" by the "pioneers" who ushered in a new era. During this period, WeChat, Toutiao and DiDi emerged, revo-lutionizing traditional industries.

While the internet was undergoing re-organization, two important data platforms, Alibaba and Tencent, were born. Meanwhile, Tubatu was do-ing the same thing -- focusing on constructing a platform ecosystem. It took Tubatu ten years to explore the chain in the "deep water area" and construct infrastructure in the "deep water area". After the com-pletion of the platform infrastructure, the new direction and strategy of Tubatu have been transformed into online, data intelligence and net-work synergy.

The "Hundred Million Plan", proposed by Wang Guobin, the chairman and CEO of Tubatu, targets to "nurture 1000 enterprises with annual revenue exceeding RMB100 million and 10,000 enterprises with annual revenue exceeding RMB10 million" in the next five years. As an industry empowerment plan proposed after the upgrade of its platform strategy, Tubatu will enable all market participants gain the ac-cess to resources on the platform and create an empowerment pan-home renovation platform with all the service providers in the home renovation industry, and further re-construct the relationship between enterprises and consumers.

"Empowerment" is the key to realize the plan, which is also the platform value reaffirmed by Alibaba, Tencent and JD.com on various occasions. In order to realize the "Hundred Million Plan", Tubatu has upgraded the three major systems of the empowerment platform, including a new credit system, a new efficiency system and a new organ-ization system.

In these three major systems, Tubatu will gather a large amount of UGC through this platform for content accumulation and social interaction and will effectively match the supply of enterprises with the demand of consumers by changing the connection of home renovation, and enter-prises with good reputation will be recommended to and known by more customers. Moreover, through the Tumax3D cloud design system, Tubatu will be deeply engaged in each of every phase of design, prod-ucts and construction, consolidate the construction and operation sys-tem, and forward the demand feedback data to B end and F end via big data analysis and consumption behavior data of users, thus enhancing operating efficiency. After the empowerment in aspects of credit and ef-ficiency Tubatu will provide marketing, IT technology, quality inspection, procurement, logistics and installation services, further improve the service capability and renovation quality of enterprises by facilitating en-terprises to concentrate on design and construction only.

In the future, the online home renovation platform will become an eco-system that empowers outstanding designers and renovation companies in the industry. At this stage, Tubatu will serve as a platform to assist business startups and innovation in the industry. Independent IPs such as some famous designers will emerge from the platform when VR, AR and other technologies will be widely used.

With such an ecosystem, Tubatu will become a hub and engine connect-ing multiple ends while expanding the boundary and capability of the platform and eventually achieving network synergy. The future of net-work synergy will be relocation costs growing without a ceiling. In the same case as WeChat, when user group is large enough, the platform can hardly be replaced by other instant communication tools.

China's online home renovation market reveals a huge potential, and therefore giving rise to unlimited possibilities in the future. Today, Qeeka Home makes the first attempt in the capital market, while in future online home renovation market, especially industrial leaders will defi-nitely attract more attentions of an increasing number of investors . If Tubatu files for Hong Kong IPO in the near future as market news indi-cates, it will, undoubtedly, be an event more worth waiting for in the capital market.

Topic: Press release summarySectors: Daily Finance, Daily News^[1][2] http://www.acnnewswire.com From the Asia Corporate News Network

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References

1. ^{^} Daily Finance (www.acnnewswire.com)
2. ^{^} Daily News (www.acnnewswire.com)