---
title: "“Ham King” Invests 300 Million in a New Company, Market Value Soars to 10 Billion"
description: "A 300 million yuan investment by Zhejiang's time-honored brand and 'first ham stock' Jinzi Ham into a chip company has sparked market frenzy, with its market value peaking at 10.25 billion yuan. The move is part of the company's broader cross-industry investment strategy, which has included ventures in finance, healthcare, and AI, as it seeks a second growth curve beyond its core ham business."
author: "天下网商"
publisher: "New Distribution"
email: "zhaobo258@gmail.com"
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published: "2025-10-18"
categories: "Capital, Earnings & M&A"
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original_source: "https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/TA1cCAz5qMAG03xt_0qO2g"
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# “Ham King” Invests 300 Million in a New Company, Market Value Soars to 10 Billion

> A 300 million yuan investment by Zhejiang's time-honored brand and 'first ham stock' Jinzi Ham into a chip company has sparked market frenzy, with its market value peaking at 10.25 billion yuan. The move is part of the company's broader cross-industry investment strategy, which has included ventures in finance, healthcare, and AI, as it seeks a second growth curve beyond its core ham business.

**Source**丨天下网商
What do ham and chips have in common? A 300 million yuan investment has linked the two. Recently, Jinzi Ham, a time-honored brand in Zhejiang Province and the "first ham stock," announced it would invest 300 million yuan in Hangzhou Zhongsheng Microelectronics, acquiring no more than 20% of its equity.
The announcement immediately sparked market discussion. With chip and AI concepts attracting a large influx of capital, Jinzi Ham's stock price quickly hit the daily limit, and on September 24, its market value peaked at 10.25 billion yuan.
According to public information, Jinzi Ham was founded in 1994, with main products including ham, sausages, air-dried meat, and broth. It has also launched innovative products such as ham ice cream and ham eight-treasure porridge. In addition to being available on major e-commerce platforms, Jinzi Ham has cooperated with brands like "Suzhou Hui," "Zhang Sheng Ji," and "Wufangzhai," and has entered large supermarket chains such as Walmart and Carrefour.
Jinzi Ham's investment target, Zhongsheng Microelectronics, is an optical communication chip company founded in 2019. Its main business includes optical communication chips and TIAs (transimpedance amplifiers), typically used in AI computing centers and cloud data centers. From January to July 2025, Zhongsheng Microelectronics had revenue of 510,000 yuan and a net loss of 20.37 million yuan.
This seemingly unrelated investment reveals Jinzi Ham's cross-industry investment landscape.
Since 2014, Jinzi Ham has ventured into microfinance, healthcare, AI large models, and other fields. The founder has stated that the company will enter a "dual main business" driven model. In 2025, Jinzi Ham also established two semiconductor-related subsidiaries, attempting to catch up with the booming AI trend.
Beyond its core ham business, Jinzi Ham is seeking a second growth curve. But what this cross-industry "gamble," which stakes six years of company profits, will ultimately yield is not an easy question to answer.
**The Risk-Taking "Ham King"**
Jinzi Ham was born in Jinhua, Zhejiang, known as the "hometown of Chinese ham."
In 1994, 30-year-old Shi Yanjun resigned from his job at a supply and marketing cooperative and founded the predecessor of Jinzi Ham. He mentioned that the entrepreneurial opportunity came when he heard a friend bought four Jinhua hams to take to Shenzhen, spending 120 yuan—at that time, this amount was equivalent to more than four months of Shi Yanjun's salary.
The considerable profit margins drove the emergence of hundreds of ham companies. With product innovations such as small packaging and reduced-salt options, Jinzi Ham quickly became an industry leader. In 2010, Jinzi Ham was listed on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange, earning the title "First Ham Stock."
Currently, Jinzi Ham has two main brands: the ham brand "Jinzi" and the European-style fermented meat brand "Bama."
Both "Jinzi" and "Bama" have official flagship stores on Tmall. "Jinzi" mainly sells traditional Chinese cured meats like sausages, ham gift boxes, and "Daobanxiang" (a type of cured pork), while "Bama" focuses on high-priced products like Spanish Iberian raw ham slices. Store promotional content shows that Jinzi Ham has ranked first in sales in the Jinhua ham industry for four consecutive years (2021–2024).
Behind the "industry first" label, Jinzi Ham's business has been under pressure.
From financial data, the company's performance shows a "V-shaped fluctuation" rather than steady growth. From 2022 to 2024, Jinzi Ham's revenue was 445 million yuan, 314 million yuan, and 344 million yuan, respectively, with net profits attributable to the parent company of 49.03 million yuan, 40.06 million yuan, and 62.17 million yuan.
In the first half of 2025, Jinzi Ham's revenue was 169 million yuan, down 14.73% year-on-year; net profit attributable to the parent was 22.92 million yuan, down 25.11% year-on-year. Among them, the three main channels contributing to revenue—e-commerce, key account distribution, and direct sales (group buying)—decreased by 3.15 million yuan, 0.73 million yuan, and 9.14 million yuan, respectively.
In the end, the ham business is not as easy as it seems. The ham industry is deeply affected by the "pig cycle," where hog prices are linked to operating costs. Additionally, ham flavor changes with cellar storage time, placing higher demands on inventory management.
In the consumer market, young users lack a good understanding of ham's cooking techniques and nutritional value, leading to slowing demand growth, which has caused the category to face declining sales and falling prices.
Overall, Jinzi Ham is a time-honored brand seeking progress. It formulated China's first fermented meat product standard, its product "Ham Broth" obtained a national invention patent, and it has launched innovative products like "reduced-salt cured meat" and "ham ice cream" to attract young customers, even developing its own e-commerce standalone site, "Bama Mall."
Being accustomed to risk and innovation is the implicit corporate gene of Jinzi Ham. For this company that loves to "tinker," the leap from ham to chips is just the tip of the iceberg in its cross-industry investment landscape.
**Venturing Everywhere, Capturing Industry Trends**
For ordinary companies, cross-industry moves are high-risk and require careful consideration of asset fit. For Jinzi Ham, cross-industry is its investment style.
As early as 2013, Jinzi Ham invested 87.75 million yuan to acquire 67.5% of Zhejiang Chuangyi, thereby indirectly holding 1.15% of the coal mining company Shenbao Energy, entering the mining and rare earth sectors.
In 2015, Jinzi Ham invested 120 million yuan to become one of the six founding shareholders of Zhejiang E-Commerce Bank. Shi Yanjun said that as a "small ham businessman," he was honored to witness the birth of one of China's first private banks.
In 2016, Jinzi Ham acquired 51% of the private equity firm Zhongyu Capital, focusing on investments in the health sector. Shi Yanjun stated at the annual performance briefing that Jinzi Ham would establish a "dual main business" model, strengthen the healthcare industry, and effectively improve operating performance.
Subsequently, although Jinzi Ham changed ownership, its "cross-industry" gene remained unchanged. In 2023, Jinzi Ham invested 400 million yuan in Zhejiang Yindun Cloud Technology, attempting to bet on the AI computing power hotspot.
Jinzi Ham's innovative products like ham biscuits and ham ice cream are flexible and diverse, and its ventures capture the latest industry trends, forming its investment logic.
In 2025, Jinzi Ham welcomed a new helmsman—Fujian businessman Zheng Qingsheng. According to public information, Zheng was previously active in real estate and automobile sales. After taking office, he established two wholly-owned semiconductor-related subsidiaries and led the 300 million yuan investment in Zhongsheng Microelectronics.
It is reported that Zhongsheng Microelectronics, with its technical strength, was selected for the "China Future Unicorn TOP100" and "Hangzhou Quasi-Unicorn Enterprise" lists in 2024 and 2025.
Industry insiders believe that the outcome of this investment will depend on several factors: whether Zhongsheng Micro's commercialization ability can turn technology into actual profits; whether post-investment management and risk control can be implemented; and whether Jinzi Ham itself has sufficient management capability to achieve resource coordination and balanced development under a completely cross-industry "dual main business" structure.
Such "whimsical" investment moves have also sparked speculation about its business. On September 26, an investor asked on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange's "Interactive Easy" platform: Does the company's food sales rely on artificial intelligence? Is the system connected to DeepSeek?
Jinzi Ham replied that it has not yet used DeepSeek-related technology in its business, but the company will continue to pay attention to the development and application of AI technology and promote digital transformation.
**Cross-Industry Investment: Gamble or Remedy?**
Jinzi Ham's "unrestrained" cross-industry investments are not unique.
Lotus MSG, another domestic time-honored brand, is an excellent example. In recent years, under the "siege" of new products like chicken essence and matsutake fresh, Lotus MSG's performance has been declining, even falling into insolvency.
After a difficult asset restructuring, Lotus Holdings established a subsidiary, Lotus Kechuang, in 2023, announcing the purchase of 330 Nvidia H800 servers to enter the computing power leasing track.
This "cross-industry" business grew into Lotus Holdings' second growth curve. In 2024, Lotus MSG's revenue and net profit increased by 25.98% and 55.92% year-on-year, respectively, hitting record highs. The financial report shows that the computing power business brought Lotus Holdings 80.64 million yuan in revenue in 2024, a surge of 10,447% year-on-year.
Interestingly, Lotus Holdings has been making large-scale cross-industry investments since 2000, covering clothing, condiments, health products, mineral water, thermal power, feed, and more. Most of these investments ended in failure, with individual businesses losing tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of yuan annually, until the later "computing power cross-industry" move turned things around.
Image source: Lotus Holdings 2024 financial report
Besides Lotus MSG, other brands also often have surprising investment behaviors.
Fujian clothing brand Septwolves obtained 130 million yuan in investment income in the first half of 2025, far exceeding its main clothing sales business; "Six Walnut" parent company Yangyuan Drinks has an investment landscape spanning artificial intelligence, new energy batteries, media, semiconductors, and more.
Like Jinzi Ham, as many people criticize these companies for being "short-sighted" and "trend-chasing," there are those who admire them for "forging ahead" and "daring to decide."
In essence, when the main business underperforms, "cross-industry investment" is a justifiable option. The difference lies in whether, after obtaining a ticket to a new business, the company continues to deepen based on existing business experience, or chases trends and loses its original business purpose, which will determine the company's future direction.
References:
1. Jinzi Ham related financial reports from 2019 to 2025
2. Lotus Holdings related financial reports from 2024 to 2025
3. Shenzhen Stock Exchange "Interactive Easy" platform
4. Jinzi Ham official website: Interview | Jinzi Ham Chairman Shi Yanjun: From a monthly salary of 27.5 yuan to the head of a listed company, what did he experience?
5. Node Finance: Behind Zheng Qingsheng's 300 million bet on semiconductors, Jinzi Ham 'abandons meat for chips'?
6. Beijing Business Today: Jinzi Ham's cross-industry failures and repeated attempts
7. Wild Horse Finance: After 'A-share good father-in-law' compensated 55 million, Jinzi Ham was investigated, former actual controller cashed out 2.3 billion
8. Yinshen Finance: Jinzi Ham's 300 million bet on semiconductors, can it break the decade-long cross-industry losing streak?


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## Citation metadata

- Publisher: New Distribution
- Author: 天下网商
- Published: 2025-10-18
- Canonical: https://xinjignxiao.com/en/articles/ham-king-invests-300-million-in-a-new-company-market-value-soars-to-10-b-40f07be1/
- Original source: https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/TA1cCAz5qMAG03xt_0qO2g

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