Meicai

Meicai (美菜网), operated by Beijing Spruce World Information Technology Co., Ltd. (formerly Beijing Yunshan World Information Technology), is a Beijing-based business-to-business e-commerce platform that connects farmers and food producers directly with restaurants and small food-service merchants across China. Founded in June 2014 by Liu Chuanjun, the company built its own cold-chain logistics network, warehousing, and delivery fleet to shorten the produce supply chain between farms and kitchens, an approach it describes as farmer-to-business (F2B). By early 2021 the company said it had built out operations in more than 200 Chinese cities with roughly 150 logistics centers and tens of thousands of delivery vehicles serving restaurant and food-shop customers nationwide. Meicai raised roughly $1.3-1.5 billion across eight disclosed financing rounds between 2014 and 2018, reaching a reported $7 billion valuation after its October 2018 round, and it explored both a U.S. and later a Hong Kong initial public offering, though neither has closed. Since 2019, public reporting has also described repeated cost pressure, city and warehouse contraction, layoffs, and executive turnover as the company worked to find a sustainable operating model, and it has continued to draw regulatory scrutiny over vendor oversight and food-safety compliance on its platform.