Joelle Permut

BabyCare operates 20 centers in 16 cities and plans to expand to eight more cities in 2006. BabyCare is the brainchild of Matthew J. Estes, a 39-year-old San Diego native who has lived and worked in China for 15 years, part of that time as a sales manager for pharmaceutical maker SmithKline Beecham, now GlaxoSmithKline PLC (GSK ). He founded BabyCare to exploit what he saw as a big potential market in China for nutritional supplements for expectant mothers and infants. BabyCare's rapid growth has, predictably, attracted venture capitalists. The company has raised a total of $24 million in three rounds of funding since it began. Investors include Silicon Valley VC fund Sutter Hill Ventures, and Hong Kong's Pacific Group.