When Eddy Tang dropped out of medical school more than two decades ago, little did he know that his entrepreneurial drive would lead him to establish what would become Hong Kong’s largest non-hospital medical services provider. EC Healthcare, the company he founded in 2005 with a paltry HK$150,000 in savings, now offers services ranging from medical aesthetics to dental care and hair treatments , operates 80 clinics in Hong Kong, mainland China and Macau, and is listed on the Hong Kong stock exchange. The 42-year-old and his team are based on several floors of a high-rise in the bustling Kowloon district of Mong Kok. The design and layout of the headquarters are inspired by the dynamic vibe of a Silicon Valley company, as one of Tang’s colleagues explains when we meet Tang for an interview in his airy office on the 50th floor of the building. Life, however, wasn’t always this easy for Tang, who comes from a humble background and attributes his success to a “family tragedy”. When Tang was 13, his father had a stroke and needed hospital care, which had a big impact on the family’s financial situation. Tang’s mother became the main breadwinner, and Tang and his two siblings helped her take care of his father. Moving from a middle class neighbourhood to public housing was a major blow for Tang, who set his sights on becoming a doctor to help cure his dad and support his family. After only two years, however, Tang had to suspend his studies to help his parents deal with some financial issues, which turned out to be a great decision for his career. “I worked in sales and marketing and never went back to medical school,” says Tang, now a married father of three. “It was like studying a new subject at university. I learned by working and by reading books and watching coaching videos. I went from being nobody to making the most sales that year. Then, I was headhunted by a listed company. I was also studying business part time while working and majored in accounting and finance.” Tang learned the inner workings of the beauty sector while employed as a sales director at two companies that operated chains of salons, but in 2005, aged 27, he decided to leave his corporate job and start his own company. At first, he wanted to establish an education platform but an encounter with a doctor who wanted to start a medical aesthetics training school led him back to his first passion, the beauty services industry. “I went to his clinic and checked out his facilities and he had a lot of equipment for medical aesthetics, but then he decided not to go ahead with the training course because it required a lot of investment and he felt that there was no potential market. So I told him that he was making a loss by having those facilities and not using them,” explains Tang. He partnered with the doctor and invested HK$150,000 of his own money in the venture. Two years later, he bought the doctor out – and that was the official start of his company, which would later expand to more than 30 brands, including Hair Forest, Dr Reborn, Swissline and Pathlab. After analysing the business models of Hong Kong beauty and wellness chains, Tang realised that most of them were very good at marketing, branding and building client relationships but didn’t invest in the quality of the services they offered. “I wanted to fill that gap because, thanks to my background, I knew the science and a lot of doctors,” says Tang. “I wanted to inject medical technology, machines and medicine scientifically proven to be effective, and to provide beauty services at a high level and promise good results. By word of mouth, customers would come. We wanted to show that you don’t have to go to the beauty salon every week and get a lot of treatments without results.” Customers should be able to come once a month and save time, he says, adding that even though the cost per visit was higher, the company could guarantee better results and value for money. Tang soon realised the health care industry was also ripe for disruption. In the same way he had incorporated science and technology into medical aesthetics , he wanted to improve everyday doctor’s consultations. His pet peeve with general practitioners was that they had great knowledge and sound science but their marketing, branding and customer service were subpar, which is why he wanted to apply the lessons he learned in the wellness industry to ordinary health care. “I saw a lot of potential in bringing the service element of the beauty industry to medical care,” says Tang. He explains that customers in Hong Kong and China have become more knowledgeable and educated about health, wellness and beauty, thanks in part to their access to online information. His company does a lot of data mining to offer personalised services and to combat what he calls “the lack of transparency and information imbalance” that are typical of the beauty and health industries. “We have to be client-centric but the business used to be completely doctor-centric,” says Tang, adding that 80 per cent of the business is from repeat customers. Before the coronavirus pandemic and the ensuing border closures, 40 per cent of EC Healthcare customers were mainland Chinese. “They trust medical professionals in Hong Kong because doctors are renowned for their professionalism and ethics and the authenticity of the supplies, which they can’t always get in China,” he says, adding that in China the black market for beauty services and products is a major issue. Unlike customers in Hong Kong, who Tang says like to keep private about their aesthetic procedures, wealthy Chinese are very open about their treatments and actively post about them on social media, like they would a recent luxury purchase or a Michelin-starred dinner. This evolution in the perception of wellness as a status symbol on par with high-end fashion or exclusive experiences has been happening for quite a while, but Tang believes the pandemic has accelerated this trend, both in Hong Kong and mainland China. In spite of the business lost because of coronavirus-related temporary closures this year, Tang says that spending by Hong Kong customers has gone up as they haven’t been able to travel and instead have focused on “looking good and being healthy”. Seventy per cent of the customer base is still female, down from 80 to 90 per cent a decade ago. Tang says that thanks to the rise of K-pop, celebrity culture and social media, more men are embracing treatments, especially successful men in their 40s and 50s. Women, however, are still the decision-makers when it comes to family choices in health care, and they remain the main target demographic for Tang’s various businesses, which span 22 different disciplines. Tang is bullish about the prospects for the health care, wellness and beauty sectors, both in Hong Kong and in mainland China. “As people become more health-conscious and educated and higher demand is created by social media and celebrities, the market will be booming,” Tang says. “The medical business is normally very transactional and not customer-driven, but customers now are proactive. They want to get healthier and look better, and want a better experience and are creating demand and, with the support of technology and social media, we see a boom for chains like ours and home care and more.” Tang has plans to expand both in mainland China and Hong Kong, which he thinks will recover fast from the recent stagnation caused by the coronavirus pandemic and the social unrest that preceded it. “Hong Kong will still be the most important financial hub in the region and the economy and GDP [gross domestic product] will be very good,” he says. “Wealthy people, now that they’re more health conscious, will still come here for the best services because it’s [immaterial] to them; their income won’t be affected. If you are a good brand, they will come to you.”