Viablife: New Ingredients Bring More Efficacy

The trends of new cosmetic ingredients is two key: high quality and innovation.

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The beauty industry has encountered various challenges this year. The total retail sales of consumer goods in China for cosmetics was 245.3 billion yuan(about $34.1 billion) from January to August 2022, down 6.4% year-on-year. However, China's efficacy skincare market has been growing rapidly in recent years, with a compound annual growth rate of 23.4%, and is expected to reach 41.1 billion yuan(about $5.7 billion) in 2022. CHAILEEDO invited Tao Fuping, CEO of Hangzhou Viablife Biotech Co., Ltd., to share with us the trends of Chinese cosmetics.

CHAILEEDO: From your perspective, what is the biggest trend in the cosmetics industry next year? 

Tao Fuping: Personally, I think that the biggest trend in the cosmetics industry next year is new products that made in China, which represented by Chinese brands will increasingly win approval from consumers. It’s not even a short-term trend for next year, but a mid- to long-term trend. Whether it is the enhancement of the country’s comprehensive strength, the growth of a new generation of consumers, the self-confidence and pride of the people, or the increasing competitiveness of Chinese brands, Chinese enterprises, and Chinese ingredients, they will eventually converge into a major trend, that is the new Chinese products will become more and more popular, even going overseas.

CHAILEEDO: What are the trends of new ingredients in the cosmetic industry next year?

Tao Fuping: The trends of new cosmetic ingredients can be concluded into two keywords: high quality and innovation. As information becomes more and more transparent, consumers pay more attention to ingredients and become more and more professional in understanding the ingredients. Ingredients have become a significant factor in the competition in cosmetics industry. Thus, making high-quality ingredients is in line with future consumption upgrades and high-quality development. Applying more new technologies and creating more new ingredients can bring more efficacy and create more value to consumers.

CHAILEEDO: Will synthetic biology replace extracts of animals and plants?

Tao Fuping: As a very hot topic in the past two years, synthetic biotechnology has attracted a lot of attention, and there is a lot of room for imagination in the future.

As an emerging comprehensive technology developed in the last decade or two, synthetic biotechnology achieves a balance between green environmental protection and large-scale production through the transformation and reconstruction of various organisms, making the biological transformation and reconstruction more scientific, precise and controllable, which can better serve human society and empower industrial development.

However, I think as a promising new technology, the emergence of synthetic biotechnology does not imply to replace existing technologies, such as animal and plant extracts and chemical synthesis, but rather to better serve various industries, including the development of the cosmetics industry, to bring consumers greener, healthier, more efficacy products and technologies with excellent quality and reasonable price.

There are many excellent technologies and products with existing animal and plant extracts as well, for example, Chinese herbal medicine components are not a single ingredient, but a natural mixture. And chemical synthesis also has some technical processes that are green and environmentally friendly. Therefore, synthetic biotechnology complements existing technologies, rather than replacing them. It serves industrial development and human well-being together with existing good technologies and products.