GE HealthCare is reportedly weighing the sale of a stake in its China division, which maintains about 7,000 employees across multiple R&D and manufacturing sites, and spans both imaging and radiopharmaceuticals.
A story from Bloomberg said the company is in the early stages of exploring its options for the deal, which could end up setting the value of its total assets within the country in the billions of dollars.
Revenues from sales in China totaled $2.13 billion in 2024, according to GE HealthCare’s annual report, ranking it as its third-largest market after the U.S. and Europe.
The region saw a drop of 15% versus the year prior, which affected all business segments. The company attributed the decline to 2023 being boosted in part by COVID-era stimulus programs in the country—when that year logged 10% growth—as well as to China’s ongoing anti-corruption campaigns that tightened hospital spending. Fellow imaging giants Philips and Siemens Healthineers saw similar annual declines.
More recently, with the imposition of new tariffs on trade between the U.S. and China—plus escalating restrictions on exports of materials such as rare earth minerals—GE HealthCare earlier this year cut its 2025 financial guidance despite logging higher-than-expected revenues.
In April, the company said it would work to decrease the number of overall transpacific shipments subject to the tariffs, as well as pursue more local-for-local manufacturing and distribution across its international supply chain.
At the same time, the Chinese government announced that it opened an anti-dumping investigation into international makers of CT X-ray tubes—though GE HealthCare’s leadership said they didn’t expect the probe to have a material effect on business within the country.
But when it comes to rare earth minerals, GE HealthCare largely relies on China for gadolinium—a necessary ingredient for its MRI contrast agent portfolio, including its Clariscan and Omniscan injections for enhancing images.
This week, a story from CNBC said that rare earth supplies are still tight, citing complaints from the European Chamber of Commerce in China, with its members including carmakers and semiconductor producers. The country represented 69% of mine production in 2024, and controls nearly half of the world’s reserves.
For the specific metals used in magnets, meanwhile, exports from China hit a high point this summer following new trade agreements with the European Union and the U.S., according to an August 20 report from Reuters.