ZHONGMIAO (01471) has recently entered into a strategic partnership with ZhongAn Insurance, a leading Chinese internet insurance technology company, while also issuing a positive profit alert. This dual catalyst is driving the development of a new ecosystem that merges the real economy with internet-based insurance.
The two companies have signed a comprehensive strategic cooperation agreement. ZHONGMIAO, known as the first insurance broker listed in Hong Kong, and ZhongAn Insurance, a top player in the online insurance sector, will combine their respective strengths in industrial scenarios and internet insurance technology. Their collaboration aims to bridge offline industrial ecosystems with online insurance platforms, focusing on three key areas: customizing internet insurance products, managing industrial scene operations, and coordinating financial capital. The goal is to create a new digital paradigm for industrial insurance that serves the real economy.
Complementary strengths build a differentiated foundation
Both partners possess unique competitive advantages that are highly complementary, offering significant room for synergistic growth. ZhongAn Insurance is China's first internet-only insurer and a dominant force in the online insurance market, founded by Alibaba, Tencent, and Ping An. Within a decade of its 2017 Hong Kong listing, it rose to become the 8th largest property and casualty insurer in the country, consistently holding the top market share in online property insurance. It leads in specialized segments like health, pet, and new energy vehicle insurance. The company operates a fully online insurance system with proprietary technology engines and AI models, enabling capabilities like AI underwriting, fraud detection, and online damage assessment. Leveraging a vast pool of online users and merchant ecosystems, it can quickly develop tailored, lightweight insurance products using over a decade of online risk data, achieving underwriting profits year after year.
ZHONGMIAO, incubated by the Haier Group and listed as the first Hong Kong insurance broker, follows a "scenario + technology + ecosystem" strategy. It applies Haier's industrial philosophy to the insurance sector, extending its insurance distribution business into risk management technology services. The two companies share a highly compatible technological core, with resources and capabilities that create strong mutual benefits. ZHONGMIAO provides extensive offline industrial scenarios, comprehensive supply chain risk data, and on-the-ground service capabilities. ZhongAn Insurance contributes a mature suite of online standardized insurance products, full-chain AI digital operations, and proprietary insurance technology. This partnership enables a deep collaboration between the industrial ecosystem and the internet insurance ecosystem, driving dual empowerment and creating a new growth trajectory distinct from traditional distribution models in a mature market.
In the current industry downturn, weaker players are exiting and resources are consolidating around leaders. ZHONGMIAO’s differentiated advantages have become more apparent. Driven by insurance distribution and financial technology, the company has maintained steady growth since its listing. By 2025, its revenue and net profit have achieved a compound annual growth rate of 20% over five years. On July 29, the company issued a profit alert for the first half of the year, indicating revenue growth of over 50% and a net profit increase of more than 80% year-on-year. This strong performance is attributed to ongoing investments in insurance technology innovation, particularly in AI-driven risk reduction and intelligent claims processing, which enhance efficiency, customer experience, and build long-term competitive barriers.
Multi-dimensional collaboration unlocks new growth and overcomes industry bottlenecks
The insurance brokerage industry is currently undergoing a shift away from extensive distribution models, with many agencies exiting as customer acquisition costs rise and profit margins shrink. Internet insurance companies, on the other hand, face challenges such as a lack of offline industrial scenarios, insufficient real-world risk data, and no on-the-ground service teams. This partnership directly addresses these pain points, creating a multi-dimensional and sustainable growth path. The core of this collaboration is a deep integration of the industrial and internet insurance ecosystems, solving the long-standing problem of their separation. As online traffic reaches its peak and competition intensifies, insurers lack access to physical industrial scenarios and first-hand risk data, making digital technology difficult to apply. Conversely, offline industrial insurance suffers from a mismatch between supply and demand, with high customer acquisition costs and standardized products that fail to meet the specific risk profiles of different industries. The industry needs digital risk management tools. The implementation of a "reporting and settlement integration" policy is pushing the industry towards compliance, precision, and technology-driven transformation. Bridging the gap between industrial and internet insurance is the key to breaking through these challenges and is the fundamental logic behind this partnership.
By connecting data, scenarios, technology, and capital, the two companies can optimize actuarial models with first-hand operational data to develop industry-specific insurance products. IoT and AI risk management can be integrated into production processes, shifting insurance from post-event compensation to full-cycle risk management. Online and offline customer bases can be interconnected, creating a continuous flow of traffic.
Embracing the AI era and capital markets, opening a long-term ecological vision
This cross-industry collaboration between two Hong Kong-listed platforms is expected to drive sustained performance growth and potentially unlock greater long-term market value. ZhongAn Insurance, as a tech-savvy online insurance leader, and ZHONGMIAO, with its strong research-oriented background from Haier, are well-positioned to explore how AI can be integrated with insurance as a new growth driver. As pioneers in their respective sectors on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, there is also significant potential for further cooperation in the capital markets, as outlined in their strategic agreement. This partnership represents a benchmark for "technology empowering the real economy and data driving growth" in the insurance industry. It signals a move away from extensive distribution towards a new, high-quality development phase characterized by AI risk control, risk reduction, and ecological symbiosis, offering long-term value for capital market investors.
ZHONGMIAO’s clear strategic direction and consistent performance growth send a strong signal to the market. China's insurance brokerage industry is in a critical phase of consolidation and transformation. Traditional agencies relying on information asymmetry and simple commission models are being phased out, while leading companies with technological capabilities, ecosystem resources, and scale advantages will continue to gain market share. Following the international development path of giants like MMC and AON, which transformed from single sales channels into comprehensive risk management groups, revenues and market values have grown over the long term. Given the vast size of China's domestic insurance brokerage market, it is likely to produce a locally-based industry leader worth hundreds of billions in the future.
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