Newborn Town (9911.HK) expected to record doubled growth for 2021 annual revenue, reaching RMB 2,300 to 2,400 million

HONG KONG, Jan. 18, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- On 16 January, the globalized social networking company Newborn Town (9911.HK) announced its unaudited operating data and revenue information of 2021. For the past 12 months ended 31 December 2021, the Company's total revenue is estimated to reach RMB 2,300 to 2,400 million, an increase of over 95% compared with 2020.

The value-added service revenue (In-app purchase revenue) presented a leapfrog rise of about 200% year-on-year, reaching RMB 2,000-2,100 million. In 2021, the Company's value-added service (mainly from its social networking products) achieved a significant breakthrough in developed markets including Europe, North America, Japan and Korea.

In terms of user scale, the accumulative downloads of its social products reached 344 million as of 31 December 2021, an increase of approximately 15.38% compared with 30 September 2021. The monthly active users of the Company's social products reached approximately 21.79 million in Dec 2021.

I. Doubled growth in revenue with optimizing revenue structure

Since 2013, Newborn Town has targeted at the global market. In 2015, it began to focus on the globalized social networking business and successfully listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in 2019. The Company has developed and launched various audio and video social products, including Yumy, MICO and YoHo, targeting at the diversified social needs of various communities around the world, covering a number of markets such as the Middle East, Southeast Asia, South Asia, Europe, North America, Japan and Korea.

For the past 12 months ended 31 December 2021, its revenue amounted to RMB 2,300 to 2,400 million, up by over 95% year-on-year. Newborn Town only spent two years to record nearly 6 times growth in revenue after its IPO. In 2019, the Company's total revenue was RMB 390 million. Then it rose to RMB 1,180 million in 2020. In 2021, it sustained rapid growth with revenue doubled.

Newborn Town has also been optimizing the revenue structure, with in-app purchase revenue expected to reach RMB 2,000 to 2,100 million in 2021, an increase of about 200% compared with 2020. In-app purchase has contributed to higher proportion of the total revenue, and currently exceeding 80%, compared with 55.6% in 2020.

Over the past decade of operation in the global market, Newborn Town has developed its core competitiveness - localization capabilities, and successfully established a social network centering on contents, connecting global users and always delivering superior social networking experiences. With diversified content communities and social scenarios, the Company's products have gained loyal users with longer duration of use. The Company thus continued to enrich the forms of monetization and enhance efficiency in commercialization. That's also the main reason why the company's revenue structure keeps optimizing.

II. Continuous product innovation to breakthrough in global market

Many of Newborn Town's social products have shown rapid growth in several markets around the world. Yumy, the major video social app launched by Newborn Town in 2021, achieved phenomenal growth in downloads over the past six months, with its global downloads surpassing 5 million in late May, 10 million in August, 20 million in October, and 30 million in late November of 2021.

The Company has been also boosting product innovation. In November 2021, it announced the inclusion of Meta Town, a metaverse module, which is currently in alpha testing, into Yumy. In the next stage, Yumy will be integrated with more virtual scenes to show a variety of metaverse elements.

In addition, other social products of Newborn Town have also achieved steady growth. So far, MICO has entered the list of the top 10 best-selling social apps in 106 countries and regions, including Canada, the UK, Italy, etc. YoHo, a voice-based social platform, was known as one of the top 10 best-selling social apps in European and American countries such as the US and France.

Thanks to localized contents operation and continuous innovation, the cumulative downloads of the Company's social products reached 344 million as of 31 December 2021, and the monthly active users of social products approached to 21.79 million in December 2021, nearly doubled compared with the average monthly active users of 2020.

III. Multi-dimensional development of social product portfolio and ever-expanding business distribution

Recently, Newborn Town has disclosed the establishment of a fund in partnership with Spriver Tech Limited (a wholly-owned holding company of Liu Chunhe, Chairman of Newborn Town, and the largest shareholder of Newborn Town) and one of its wholly-owned subsidiaries. The fund was established to, among other purposes, participate in the going-private transaction of BLCT.US, an Internet company focusing on entertaining, socializing and wellness services for the global LGBTQ community.

The forementioned move has marked the official expansion of Newborn Town to the LGBTQ social networking business, which was an untapped, with the aim to further broaden its business scope and scale, achieve a larger market share in the exploration of social networking business. Leveraging its strengths in localization and monetization, Newborn Town is able to empower BLCT.US in the global market for further development and also achieve strong synergies with its own business.

In the future, the fund will focus on the TMT sector and keep looking for investment opportunities in metaverse, social networking, gaming and other industries from a globalized perspective, so as to help Newborn Town to prosper and locate new opportunities for faster growth.

SOURCE Newborn Town Inc.