Chinese venture capital is usually discussed through returns. A reconstruction of one firm’s full deal history shows something more useful, which is how rarely conviction survives repetition.
The funnel
IT Juzi compiled every disclosed investment by Hillhouse, covering both Hillhouse Ventures and Hillhouse Investment, from the firm’s first deal to November 2026.
The first entry is January 2005, when the firm was newly founded, and the target was Tencent. Over the following nine years the database records only four deals in total, adding Blue Moon, JD.com and Qunar.
Scale arrived after 2014, when Hillhouse made 13 investments in a single year. The full record now stands at 1,167 unique events across 842 companies.
Of those 842 companies, 599 received exactly one cheque, or about 70 per cent. Another 187 received two, and 39 received three. Only 17 reached four or more.
That is a funnel of 842, then 243, then 56, then 17. One company in fifty earns a fourth investment.
The seventeen
Monster Charging leads with seven rounds. Silin Robotics took six. Horizon Robotics, Mobike, Turbo Cloud and MiniMax each took five. The remaining eleven each took four, and span very different sectors: BeiGene, CarDekho, Beike, DEEPEXI, MOODY, X-Epic, J&T Express, Xingrui Pharma, Galaxea, D-Robotics and Guanglian Xinke.
Vintage decides the outcome
The six companies Hillhouse first backed between 2014 and 2017 and then continued to fund have all found an exit. BeiGene, Horizon Robotics, Beike and Monster Charging listed. Mobike was acquired by Meituan in April 2018. CarDekho filed for a listing in the third quarter of 2026. Three of the six were entered at Series A or earlier.
Of the seven first backed between 2018 and 2021, only DEEPEXI and J&T Express have listed. Public funding for MOODY, Turbo Cloud and X-Epic stopped in 2021. Xingrui Pharma is still operating. Silin Robotics moved its holding entity offshore to keep raising.
Between 2022 and 2023 the only repeated bet was MiniMax, which listed in January 2026. The three companies first backed from 2024 onward, Galaxea, D-Robotics and Guanglian Xinke, are all still private.
Six out of six against seven out of two is not a change in judgement. It is a change in the price of entry. The 2018 to 2021 window was the most expensive three years in the market, and the companies Hillhouse concentrated on were the most sought-after names in each subsector. When the cycle turned, valuations and funding momentum turned together.
Position size follows entry point
BeiGene is the longest held of the seventeen. Hillhouse entered at Series A in November 2014 and participated in all eight subsequent rounds, committing more than USD 1.3 billion in total and holding a peak stake of 12.21 per cent. BeiGene listed on Nasdaq in 2016, in Hong Kong in 2018 and on the STAR Market in 2021. Hillhouse began selling in batches from 2023 and by May 2025 had reduced its stake to 4.89 per cent, realising more than HKD 10.6 billion across eleven years.
Horizon Robotics was held for the longest stretch per deal. Hillhouse entered at seed in September 2015, when the company was less than a year old, then followed through two A+ rounds in 2017, a B round in 2020 and a C round in July 2022. The five investments span 82 months. Horizon listed in Hong Kong in October 2024 with Hillhouse holding 4.04 per cent before the IPO.
MiniMax closed fastest. Hillhouse entered at Series A in March 2022 and made five investments in two years. MiniMax listed in Hong Kong on 9 January 2026 at HKD 165 per share, raising HKD 4.189 billion, rising 78 per cent on the first day. Hillhouse held 1.23 per cent before listing, diluted to 1.11 per cent.
The spread between the highest and lowest final stakes is six-fold, from 12.21 per cent at BeiGene to 1.23 per cent at MiniMax. The reason is position, not preference. BeiGene and Monster Charging were entered early and followed throughout, before external capital diluted the register. J&T Express was already fourteen years old when Hillhouse arrived and could only be allocated 2 per cent. MiniMax took RMB 30.29 billion of funding over two years, which compressed the percentage even for a Series A entrant.
What the record actually shows
A firm can be right about a sector and still end up with a small stake, because the size of the position is decided by when the cheque is written rather than how strongly the thesis is held.
The robotics names in the list, Silin Robotics, Galaxea and D-Robotics, are all still private. Their vintages sit in the period that has produced the fewest exits so far.
Editor’s note: This is an adapted translation of the original 36Kr report. It has been trimmed and restructured for readability for an international business audience. The full original (in Chinese) is at https://36kr.com/p/4060354815087494.