"Qi Algorithm" Receives Investment from Z Fund to Build an AI Pet Health Platform Combining Hardware and Software | 36Kr Exclusive

Written by Wang Fangyu

Edited by Su Jianxun

36Kr has learned that Chongqing Qisuanfa Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Qisuanfa"), a pet health large model company, as an enterprise of the Zhipu Z Plan, has recently received a strategic investment of tens of millions of yuan, solely invested by Z Fund. The funds raised will be mainly used for product research and development and commercialization. Qisuanfa is about to start the Series A financing, with Yuanhe Capital as the exclusive financial advisor.

Qisuanfa was established in July 2022 and is a large model technology company focusing on pet health. The company is using the multi-modal capabilities of the large model to create a pet health brand that integrates online and offline, software and hardware.

The founder of Qisuanfa, Chen Li, is a master's degree from King's College London and a researcher at Qlalgorithm Lab. He is also a serial entrepreneur. The technical partner, Liu Yudong, is a Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania, with a research direction in AI healthcare. Another technical partner, Deng Zihao, is a master's degree from the University of Pennsylvania, focusing on the research of the new generation of edge computing technology.

With the rapid development of AI large model technology, the application of large models in the field of pet healthcare is gradually increasing, and domestic entrepreneurial projects related to large model pet diagnosis and treatment are constantly emerging.

In Chen Li's view, there are many varieties of pets (cats and dogs), and artificially bred and naturally hybrid varieties are emerging in an endless stream. There are significant differences in breeding conditions and environments, which objectively result in the reality of inconsistent industry standards and uneven levels of general practitioners' coverage.

However, for AI large model diagnosis and treatment to reach a professional level to assist pet doctors in diagnosis and inquiry, it must be based on real pet diagnosis and treatment medical records to create a professional and interpretable AI health large model.

"We used the AI large model to clean and sort out tens of millions of medical records of tens of thousands of hospitals, tens of thousands of doctors, and tens of millions of pet owners in the past 10 years, and finally created the Pet Clinical Disease Symptom Probability Data Base 1.0," Chen Li said.

It is reported that the original medical record data and medical professional data of Qisuanfa come from one of the angel round investors - Kan Jiansheng.

Kan Jiansheng is the chairman of Xiaonuan Doctor, the former chairman of An'an Pet Hospital, and the founder and manager of many well-known chain pet medical-related enterprises. He has accumulated a large amount of data in the professional medical fields such as pet clinical diagnosis, medical records, and pathological research, thereby providing data support for the model establishment of Qisuanfa.

Based on the Data Base 1.0, Qisuanfa has further created the Self-training Semantic Understanding Model QIALGpet-T, the Self-training Decision-making Model QIALGpet-B, and the Professional Medical AI Database Relation RAG.

Among them, QIALGpet-T can multi-dimensionally split pet medical terms to facilitate the better understanding of medical specialized languages by the large language model. QIALGpet-B can accurately ask questions in response to the relationship between the basic information and disease symptoms of pets with diverse characteristics, ensuring that each round of Q&A in the multi-round conversation is interpretable. Relation RAG can support the high-performance retrieval of medical data.

On the basis of the "Pachi Pet" pet medical health large model, Qisuanfa has extended the Pet Doctor Agent for the hospital scene and the Pet Butler Agent for the home scene (including the "Pachi Pet" mini-program and the intelligent pet collar and camera).

Up to now, the Pet Doctor Agent of Qisuanfa has been put into use in more than 50 pet hospitals in four cities; the multi-modal large model intelligent hardware "Pachi Pet" pet health tracking collar has started multiple rounds of sales tests in the domestic market and plans to be sold overseas in 2025.

"Pachi Pet" Pet Health Tracking Collar Source: Authorized by the Enterprise

In addition, Qisuanfa also integrates various AI algorithms for pet health on the NPU chip, performs operations on the edge of the algorithm, and outputs solutions in the form of a "Pet Large Model Accelerator Card".

It is reported that the "Pet Large Model Accelerator Card" of Qisuanfa is equipped with multiple recognition models such as the pet behavior prediction algorithm, the large model feces algorithm, the multi-cat recognition algorithm, and the abnormal behavior recognition algorithm, and can be used in pet smart products such as smart litter boxes, water dispensers, and feeders. Currently, this product has signed a shipment agreement with a leading supplies brand.

"The strategic goal of Qisuanfa is to create a pet health platform in the era of large models," Chen Li said. In the next step, Qisuanfa will further roll out the large model Agent to C strategy, vigorously promote its software and hardware products for the C-end, and at the same time, the hardware products will also start to be sold overseas.

Investor Perspectives:

Li Wenjue, the partner of Z Fund, said: The landing of large models in complex scenarios requires professional and interpretable Agent technology, as well as data and know-how in the industry. The pet diagnosis and treatment companion track is a soil that is naturally suitable for the potential of large models and Agent technology. Nowadays, the pet market is huge and has a broad prospect, but it is facing core pain points such as insufficient intelligence level, difficulty in integrating data, difficulty in pets seeing a doctor, and owners' inability to understand the pets' conditions. The Qisuanfa team has a solid accumulation of software and hardware technology and rich industry resources, and has been rapidly iterating since its establishment. We expect Qisuanfa to create a new paradigm of pet medical treatment in the new generation and form a new generation of pet health brands that integrate online and offline, software and hardware.

Kan Jiansheng, the angel round investor, said: The progress of AI technology has brought many innovations to the pet industry. He is optimistic about the upgrading and breakthrough of the industry by the large model, and it is expected to lead the industry to a new height in customized medical services such as "full life cycle health management" and "exclusive guardianship and precise push". At the same time, using the generalization ability and reinforcement learning ability of the large model, the diverse characteristics and needs of "thousands of pets with thousands of faces" in pet medical treatment can be firmly implemented. It is an honor to join Qisuanfa and cooperate with Zhipu. Relying on Zhipu's technical capabilities and model resources as an industry-leading large model company, as well as the Qisuanfa team's profound understanding and cutting-edge technology of "AI healthcare", we will jointly explore more possibilities for the landing and commercialization of the pet large model.