In late May, on the occasion of the brand's tenth anniversary, Gu Yu continued to release new news about scientific research layout to the outside world.

Firstly, at the "2026 China Cosmetics Science and Technology" conference hosted by the China Fragrance and Makeup Association, Gu Yu established the "Chinese Skin and Physical Science Research Center" and released the release of the Cytokine HME ™ Series of new products. Later, at the "Biomedical Industry Innovation and Development Forum" of Gu Yu's 10th anniversary series of events, Gu Yu announced that the original "Qingnang R&D Center" had been upgraded to a research and raw material subsidiary "Qingwen Pharmaceutical", extending its research direction from cosmetics to scientific nutrition oral and innovative drug fields.

The core label of Guyu in the past decade has been whitening. According to Euromonitor International's 2025 research, based on the retail sales of whitening facial skincare products under domestic brands from 2023 to 2025, Guyu has ranked first in the country for three consecutive years. By 2025, the total sales revenue of the Guyu brand will exceed 6 billion yuan. During this period, domestic beauty brands have also undergone a shift from simply explaining product ingredients, concentration, and effective time to now accepting continuous inquiries from consumers, such as whether the product will irritate, whether sensitive skin can be used, whether color dullness and dullness can be improved, and whether long-term use is safe.

These issues have pushed whitening from a single efficacy to a more complex skin science. In the highly demanded and competitive field of whitening, ingredients, efficacy, skin feel, price, and influencer content can all be quickly imitated. The truly difficult part to replicate is the brand's understanding of Chinese skin types, control over core ingredients, precise matching of skin types and efficacy, and whether the scientific research strength accumulated behind it is solid and profound enough.

Whitening requires a better understanding of Chinese skin types

The complexity of whitening in the Chinese market is often simplified as "whitening". For many consumers, real needs are often more complex than "whitening", which may be due to dullness after staying up late, darkening of acne scars, redness after sensitivity, uneven skin tone, or reluctance to use high stimulation products after barrier damage. For brands, if whitening products only emphasize immediate effects, it is easy to fall into homogeneous competition, and it is also difficult to answer consumers' safety and adaptability questions in long-term use.

Wang Anning, founder of Guyu brand

This is also the reason why Gu Yu emphasized the research on Chinese skin types this time. Wang Anning, founder of the Guyu brand, mentioned at the press conference that the Fitzpatrick skin classification system, which is still widely used worldwide, is mainly based on the sunburn response of light skinned individuals and is generally classified as III-IV for Chinese people. In other words, for a considerable period of time in the past, many basic understandings of skincare science came from European and American populations, and the differences in skin types among Chinese consumers have not been fully studied.

This difference will directly affect the development path of the product end. The thickness of the stratum corneum, barrier lipid composition, mode of melanin production and transport, inflammatory response, and risk of pigmentation in Chinese people may all determine the mode of action of the same component in different populations. A formula that has been proven effective in the European and American markets does not necessarily mean it can be directly applied to Chinese consumers. The whitening plan proposed by Gu Yu, which is more suitable for Chinese skin types, first needs to be established on a more accurate skin database and evaluation system.

According to Gu Yu's disclosure, it has collected over 50000 dynamic operation large samples, accumulated nearly 1.6 million skin research indicators, and established a basic database. The newly established "Chinese Skin Texture and Constitution Science Research Center" will conduct research in the areas of building a basic database of Chinese skin texture, conducting refined research on segmented populations, and exploring the mechanisms of skin constitution correlation. Although this type of basic research is difficult to directly convert into sales in the short term, it will affect the company's subsequent accurate judgment of ingredients, formulas, efficacy evaluation, and products.

In the past few years, domestic beauty products have proven that they can achieve rapid growth through channels, content, and popular products. However, as traffic costs rise, efficacy claims become stricter, and consumers become more rational, brands need to re prove their long-term value.

For Gu Yu, establishing the "Chinese Skin Texture and Constitution Research Center" is not only beneficial for the subsequent research and development of its own brand. More importantly, Gu Yu hopes that research results can become a "foundation" for industry sharing, promoting the industry to shift from "experience judgment" to "evidence-based research and development" and "scientific standardization".

From one component to one mechanism

The core ingredient of Gu Yu in the field of whitening is still Guanggancao Ding. As early as 2007, when establishing a skincare laboratory, Gu Yu had already identified this ingredient and continued to invest in research and development centers, manufacturing factories, raw material factories, and upstream planting bases around it. Gu Yu disclosed that currently, through melt crystallization technology, it has increased the purity of glycyrrhizin to the industry's highest level of 99%; Through 28 nanometer encapsulation technology and targeted delivery technology, the transdermal efficiency is improved, and the effective ingredients are delivered to melanocyte related targets. This series of actions continues to release to the industry that Gu Yu has become the definer and leader of the ingredient Guanggancao Ding.

In addition, the dimension of whitening competition is also changing. Brands need to explain how ingredients work on specific skin problems, whether they can cause irritation, and whether they can balance barrier repair, inflammation control, and pigmentation management. Whitening has evolved from a single efficacy to a more complex set of solutions for skin problems.The path proposed by Dr. Yuan Chao, a French dermatologist, is to first repair the barrier, then control inflammation, and finally achieve mild whitening. "Many consumers do not lack whitening products, but what they lack is a long-term solution that can still be used in situations of sensitivity, dullness, and repeated inflammation.

Regarding this, Gu Yu also found a matching answer through continuous research. One is to confirm for the first time in a study published in IFSCC that glycyrrhizin can directly block TRPV1 channel activation and close the inflammatory trigger pathway; The second is to block the melanin transport pathway from the pathway, preventing melanin from being transported to the surface of the skin; The third is the first confirmation that it can activate the autophagy pathway in cells and actively degrade deposited melanosomes. With the deepening of research on glycyrrhizin, we have found that this ingredient is precisely matched with the skin type of Chinese people, "said Li Anzhang, Chief Research and Development Scientist of Guyu, in his sharing. These answers are also reinforcing the industry and market awareness of "whitening=light licorice=grain rain" from another dimension.

In addition to Guanggancao Ding, Guyu is also establishing a more diverse matrix of raw materials, including rare ginsenoside CK and cytokinin HME ™ Two core raw materials. The rare ginsenoside CK comes from the "intelligent enzyme biomimetic biosynthesis technology". Gu Yu claimed that it has achieved high-purity mass production with the help of AI screening technology and completed the industry's first rare ginsenoside new raw material filing. Cytokine HME ™ This is Gu Yu's newly released artificial biomimetic extracellular vesicle direction raw material, which simulates the double-layer phospholipid structure and signal delivery function of natural extracellular vesicles based on cosmetic usable raw materials, and uses AI technology to screen and deduce the ratio of active ingredients. It is worth mentioning that during this press conference, the secretion of HME by Guyu cells ™ The series of new products has also made its debut, which means that this raw material has moved from the laboratory to the dressing table, bringing consumers a cellular gene level anti-aging experience.

From a business perspective, the three major raw materials correspond to different growth directions of Guyu. Guanggancao Ding continues to support the basic whitening plate, rare ginsenoside CK connects anti-aging and life health, and secretin HME ™ It points to higher-level anti-aging repair. From this perspective, Guyu is transitioning from a whitening brand to a research and development enterprise with a multi ingredient matrix. The research and development cycle of raw materials is long, the investment is heavy, and the verification chain is complex. Short term returns are not as fast as new concepts and packaging. However, once the core raw materials are successfully developed, the brand can establish higher thresholds in formula, efficacy expression, supply chain, and long-term repurchase.

Research investment begins to be reused across tracks

Gu Yu's next imaginative space comes from outside of skincare products. According to Gu Yu's disclosure, the original "Qingnang R&D Center" has been upgraded to a research and raw material subsidiary "Qingwen Pharmaceutical". In the future, it will undertake Gu Yu's technological accumulation in plant extraction, synthetic biology, chemical synthesis, AI screening, targeted delivery, and extend scientific research from cosmetics to scientific nutrition oral and innovative drugs. President Gu Yu and co-founder of the brand, Lin Yuting, summarized this logic as "the same scientific research investment, covering the output of the third line, and achieving structural reuse of R&D resources".

This sentence is the key to understanding the future map of Guyu. In the past, the R&D investment of beauty companies mainly served skincare products, and ultimately relied on the sales and recycling of skincare products. But when companies enter into raw material research, cellular mechanism research, and life and health research, one raw material, one delivery technology, and one AI screening platform may simultaneously serve skincare products, scientific nutrition oral administration, and even drug research and development. The method of recovering R&D investment will also shift from selling a single product to jointly undertaking multiple businesses.

The first step in Guyu's plan is to scientifically nutrition orally. According to Gu Yu's disclosure, its health product brand "Gu Yu Si Shi You Fang" has been first exposed, and the product is planned to be launched within this year. Its core ingredient is related to rare ginsenoside CK, positioning it as a precise anti-aging direction. The second step is to innovate drugs. In the future, Qingwen Pharmaceutical will focus on two directions: natural products and small nucleic acids. Among them, natural products will utilize the research results of the rare ginsenoside CK that can activate the AMPK signaling pathway, focusing on aging and related chronic diseases; Small nucleic acids prioritize breakthroughs in skin diseases, while Gu Yu works with cell secretin HME ™ The target screening, packaging, and targeted delivery technologies accumulated during research and development are related.

From skincare products to scientific nutrition oral and innovative drugs, there are different regulatory systems, research and development cycles, and business logic in between. Health products need to face efficacy compliance, consumer trust, and long-term repurchase, while innovative drugs require higher investment, higher risk, and longer cycles of business. What Gu Yu can prove now is that it has accumulated a certain amount of knowledge in raw materials, skin research, and technology platforms; The next thing to prove is whether these accumulations can truly support the landing of cross track products and form new growth momentum for the income structure.

This is also the most noteworthy aspect of Gu Yu's actions this time. In the first decade, Gu Yu established consumer awareness around whitening and used Guanggancao Ding as the core label. Next, Gu Yu will continue to extend the scientific research capabilities behind whitening. On the one hand, he will continue to research the skin quality of the country's people, maintain the basic foundation of whitening, and advance into the fields of anti-aging and repair; On the other hand, by entering scientific nutrition oral and innovative drugs through Qingwen Pharmaceutical, we are seeking greater growth opportunities. Research is the fundamental foundation and driving force of Guyu, which is driving the brand towards a logical growth closer to the life and health industry.