A toothpaste brand endorsed by celebrity Hua Chenyu is now approaching the doorstep of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.

Recently, Shenzhen Xiaokuo Technology Co., Ltd., the parent company of the oral care brand "Canban," submitted a listing application to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, positioning itself to potentially become the first oral care stock on the Hong Kong market.

Under the leadership of Yin Kuo, who hails from a small town, Xiaokuo Technology has developed over more than a decade into a leading player in the industry, driven by popular products such as toothpaste and mouthwash.

Throughout its journey, the company has completed a total of 13 rounds of financing, attracting support from investors including Meihua Venture Capital, Wild Grass Venture Capital, Innovation Works, Crystal Stream Capital, ByteDance, Huaxing Growth Capital, Cornerstone Capital, Century Golden Resources Group, and Happy Wisdom, a family fund associated with Zeng Ming, former Executive Vice President and Chief of Staff at Alibaba.

The story of Xiaokuo Technology begins with Yin Kuo, who only holds a high school diploma. In 2005, after graduating from Lingbi Middle School in Anhui Province, he moved to Guangdong for work, taking on roles in factories, restaurants, and hotels. Not content with his situation, he accepted a friend's invitation in 2011 to move to Shenzhen and embark on his entrepreneurial journey.

His first venture was in smart hardware, launched in partnership with a friend. Despite challenging early conditions, the company found its footing, achieving profitability for several consecutive years and reaching a scale of nearly 100 million yuan at its peak. This successful experience laid the groundwork for Yin Kuo's second entrepreneurial endeavor.

In 2015, he founded Xiaokuo Technology in Shenzhen, initially focusing on electric toothbrushes. Facing strong competitors like Procter & Gamble and Philips, coupled with high inventory costs, the company struggled with funding shortages for an extended period, at times even unable to pay employee salaries.

Due to excessive inventory pressure, the company, which once nearly collapsed, eventually shifted its focus. In 2018, it launched the oral care brand "Canban," concentrating on the toothpaste category. Yin Kuo believed that most toothpaste formulations were outdated, and that a product leading in taste, brushing experience, and ingredient innovation could gain significant market acceptance.

Although the vision was promising, the initial high-end positioning of their toothpaste failed to drive sales. To create a hit product, Xiaokuo Technology expanded its product range, even venturing into cosmetics and personal care items, but these efforts did not meet expectations.

Recognizing that resources were spread too thin, Yin Kuo streamlined the company's operations, focusing resources on the oral care sector and particularly on the mouthwash segment. He anticipated that small, portable mouthwashes with mild flavors and pleasant scents would appeal to consumers. In 2020, when the company had only 14 million yuan left in its accounts, it allocated all remaining funds to market expansion.

This gamble paid off. Leveraging the rise of short-form video platforms and consumers' desire to try new products, the Canban probiotic mouthwash, launched in October of that year, surpassed 100 million yuan in sales within 80 days, eventually topping the mouthwash category rankings on Tmall and Pinduoduo.

This success drew significant attention and set the stage for the company to refocus on toothpaste. Aware that China's toothpaste market, valued at tens of billions of yuan, offered much greater potential than the mouthwash segment, Xiaokuo Technology began emphasizing toothpaste again in 2022, quickly turning its probiotic toothpaste series into a bestseller.

The success of its toothpaste and mouthwash products accelerated the company's growth. Over the years, Xiaokuo Technology has expanded its portfolio to include the oral care brand "Canban," the personal care brand "Xiaojiantou," and a home care brand co-founded with Hua Chenyu called "Zhongdian." Its product range now covers toothpaste, mouthwash, toothbrushes, oral sprays, and more.

Despite its diverse offerings, toothpaste remains Xiaokuo Technology's primary revenue source. According to its prospectus, the company's revenues for 2023, 2024, and 2025 were 1.096 billion yuan, 1.369 billion yuan, and 2.499 billion yuan, respectively. The basic oral care segment, which includes toothpaste and toothbrushes, contributed over 80% of annual revenue each year.

Based on 2025 retail sales data from Frost & Sullivan, Xiaokuo Technology held 8% of China's online oral care product market and 9.2% of the online toothpaste market, ranking first in both categories.

After implementing an omnichannel strategy in 2023, the company established a presence on online platforms such as Douyin, Kuaishou, Tmall, JD.com, Pinduoduo, and Xiaohongshu, while its offline business expanded to cover over 110,000 retail outlets.

The aggressive expansion into offline markets played a crucial role in the company's rapid growth. Yin Kuo emphasized that entering physical retail was vital for national market penetration, stating that brand awareness requires products to be part of consumers' daily lives, not just seen in short videos.

To meet the needs of diverse consumer groups across online and offline channels, as well as urban and rural areas, the company differentiated its products by price, size, packaging, and efficacy, while maintaining a high frequency of updates. As a result, Xiaokuo Technology now offers over 500 SKUs, with an additional 300 SKUs in its pipeline.

The company's toothpaste line is a prime example. Through long-term development, it has introduced a wide variety of toothpastes priced between 9.9 and 49.9 yuan, available in flavors such as jasmine, mint, and grape, and featuring series focused on probiotics, lysozyme, hydroxyapatite, and zeolite.

To quickly capture market share, Xiaokuo Technology employed strategies like celebrity endorsements, KOL recommendations, and live-streaming sales. In May 2025, a collaboration with Hua Chenyu generated over 900 million online impressions, with first-day GMV across platforms exceeding 13 million yuan, securing the top position in comprehensive retail sales on major e-commerce platforms.

While sales surged, marketing expenses also rose steadily. Cumulative sales and distribution costs over the three years from 2023 exceeded 3 billion yuan. Despite heavy marketing investments, the company has achieved sustained profitability at scale.

Net profits for the same period were 42 million yuan, 34 million yuan, and -18 million yuan, respectively. The loss in 2025 was primarily due to an equity-settled share-based payment expense exceeding 110 million yuan. After adjustments, net profits were approximately 54 million yuan, 66 million yuan, and 155 million yuan.

The key to winning consumer loyalty lies in the company's consumer-centric approach. Yin Kuo revealed in an interview that each product addresses the real needs of consumers across different ages and scenarios, with differentiation rooted in solving genuine pain points.

Xiaokuo Technology's rapid expansion has been supported by numerous investors. The company completed 13 rounds of financing over the years. After early backing from individual investors, it secured 10 million yuan from Mingjian Investment in May 2018, followed by investment from Tianjin Qisheng four months later.

In 2019, Meihua Venture Capital invested 10 million yuan directly and purchased 5 million yuan worth of existing shares. The following year, the company received additional funding from Wild Grass Venture Capital and Meihua Venture Capital.

Despite Yin Kuo's limited formal education, Meihua Venture Capital founding partner Wu Shichun identified him as the "small-town youth" he was looking for. Wu, who himself comes from a rural background in Jiangxi, noted that such individuals possess a strong drive to change their fate and, like Yin Kuo, demonstrate resilience and resourcefulness in challenging circumstances.

Yin Kuo soon validated this confidence. With the success of the Canban mouthwash series, he led Xiaokuo Technology to rapidly gain recognition as a dark horse in the industry, earning further investor trust.

In 2021, the company completed four financing rounds with backing from Innovation Works, Crystal Stream Capital, ByteDance, Huaxing Growth Capital, Jinding Capital, Cornerstone Capital, Yashang Nuohui, Yashang Capital, and Happy Wisdom, among others.

At the time, Crystal Stream Capital noted that consumer demand in oral care was shifting from treatment-oriented to prevention-driven, with mouthwash emerging as a high-growth category in the trend toward fast-moving consumer goods. Innovation Works observed that the company had re-entered the oral care market through mouthwash and swiftly outperformed both established and new competitors on major e-commerce platforms.

After securing a 30 million yuan investment from Happy Wisdom in September 2021, Xiaokuo Technology's valuation exceeded 1.8 billion yuan, reflecting an increase of over 1.3 billion yuan in roughly eight months.

With successive funding rounds and an influx of talent, the company successfully pivoted its focus from mouthwash to toothpaste, culminating in its current bid for a Hong Kong listing.

For Yin Kuo, the larger ambition is to build "China's Procter & Gamble." He has expressed that this dream serves as motivation for his entrepreneurial journey, and he is determined to take on the challenge.