Chinese restaurant chain Xiaocaiyuan has secured a significant investment from Harvest Capital in one of the largest financings in China's mass convenience catering sector.

This is the second round of financing for Xiaocaiyuan. The first round closed in March 2023.

The restaurant chain has received a total of 500m yuan ($70m) from Harvest Capital as its exclusive investor.

Established in 2013, Xiaocaiyuan has 500 directly managed restaurants. It focuses on a consumer-centric, standardised, digital and intelligent system to serve the fast-growing mass catering industry.

In the first three quarters of 2023, Xiaocaiyuan showed improvement in shop numbers, same-store sales and staff efficiency.

Harvest Capital chairman Song Xiangqian stated: “Today's business competition is, in essence, competing for entrepreneurs’ cognition, and even more so for their altruistic spirit and operation and management capabilities.

“We see such wisdom from the small vegetable garden team headed by chairman Wang Shugao.”

Xiaocaiyuan is a consumer company that offers a blend of technology, prioritising digitisation and intelligence in its operations.

The company has actively built smart shops that integrate online and offline functions.

It has integrated systems including SAP, CRM, BI and SCM to support business, user, operation and supply chain digitalisation.

As the exclusive external investor of Xiaocaiyuan, Harvest Capital stated that it is optimistic about China's consumer market's long-term value and potential.

The company believes that popular, high-frequency, cost-effective livelihood consumption will constitute the future direction of Chinese society’s consumption investment.

Harvest Capital will provide long-term services to Xiaocaiyuan and help the restaurant chain to further enhance its capabilities.