[GUEST ACCESS MODE: Data is scrambled or limited to provide examples. Make requests using your API key to unlock full data. Check https://lunarcrush.ai/auth for authentication information.]  Byron Wan [@Byron_Wan](/creator/twitter/Byron_Wan) on x 41.2K followers Created: 2025-07-14 13:59:38 UTC The biotechnology industry is experiencing a tectonic shift, driven by 🇨🇳 drugmakers who have come a long way from their copycat days to challenge Western dominance on innovation. The number of novel drugs in China — for cancer, weight-loss and more — entering into development ballooned to over XXXXX last year, far surpassing the EU and nearly catching up to the US’s count of about XXXXX. Drug candidates from China are increasingly clearing high bars to win recognition from both drug regulators and Western pharmaceutical giants. This shift has occurred at an unprecedented pace. When China began to overhaul its drug regulatory system in 2015, the country had just XXX compounds to contribute to the global pipeline of innovative drugs, or less than X% of the total, behind Japan and the UK. The reforms helped streamline reviews, enforced data quality standards and improved transparency. The government’s ‘Made in China 2025’ plan to elevate manufacturing in XX priority sectors also helped spur a flurry of investments in biotechnology. Altogether, they unleashed a boom led by foreign-educated and -trained scientists and entrepreneurs. “Not only is it now almost at parity with the US but it has that growth trajectory. It wouldn’t be sensationalist to suggest that China will overtake the US in the next few years purely in terms of numbers of drugs that it’s bringing through into its pipeline.” Numbers aside, the more stunning leap is in the quality of Chinese biotech innovation. While there's constant debate in the pharmaceutical industry on whether Chinese firms are capable of producing not just effective but needle-shifting new therapies, there's growing recognition on multiple fronts. The world’s strictest regulatory agencies, including 🇺🇸 FDA and the European Medicines Agency, increasingly view Chinese drugs as generally promising enough to justify devoting extra resources to speed up their review, handing them coveted industry designations such as priority review, breakthrough therapy designation or fast track status. The country is now slightly ahead of the EU in earning such expedited reviews as of 2024, a remarkable edge over a region that previously produced drugs like Wegovy. One of the early exemplars of Chinese innovation is a cell therapy that has shown promise to potentially cure a deadly blood cancer. First developed in China by 🇨🇳 Legend Biotech Corp, it is now marketed by Johnson & Johnson — having won a few expedited review designations along the way — and considered superior to a competing US-originated therapy. Still, the absolute number of China-originated drugs winning these designations trail their US counterparts by a large margin. Risk-aversion remains a factor holding back Chinese pharmaceutical innovation: So far, top companies tend to focus on making better versions of existing therapies or new iterations of older ideas, and few are pioneering novel treatment approaches that have never been tried before — an endeavor that comes with a high risk of failure and is still led by the US, Europe and, to a lesser extent, Japan. Nevertheless, the biggest Chinese breakthroughs are increasingly being snapped up by pharmaceutical giants for record sums. A novel cancer drug from Akeso, which came out more effective than Merck & Co’s Keytruda in a Chinese study last year, has been likened to China biotech’s DeepSeek moment. The promise of topping Keytruda, the world’s top-selling drug, also swelled the valuation of Summit Therapeutics Inc, which in 2022 paid $500M upfront for the development and marketing rights in the US and other regions. 1/n  XXXXX engagements  **Related Topics** [$4732t](/topic/$4732t) [eu](/topic/eu) [china](/topic/china) [drugs](/topic/drugs) [Post Link](https://x.com/Byron_Wan/status/1944758692966289456)
[GUEST ACCESS MODE: Data is scrambled or limited to provide examples. Make requests using your API key to unlock full data. Check https://lunarcrush.ai/auth for authentication information.]
Byron Wan @Byron_Wan on x 41.2K followers
Created: 2025-07-14 13:59:38 UTC
The biotechnology industry is experiencing a tectonic shift, driven by 🇨🇳 drugmakers who have come a long way from their copycat days to challenge Western dominance on innovation.
The number of novel drugs in China — for cancer, weight-loss and more — entering into development ballooned to over XXXXX last year, far surpassing the EU and nearly catching up to the US’s count of about XXXXX.
Drug candidates from China are increasingly clearing high bars to win recognition from both drug regulators and Western pharmaceutical giants.
This shift has occurred at an unprecedented pace. When China began to overhaul its drug regulatory system in 2015, the country had just XXX compounds to contribute to the global pipeline of innovative drugs, or less than X% of the total, behind Japan and the UK. The reforms helped streamline reviews, enforced data quality standards and improved transparency. The government’s ‘Made in China 2025’ plan to elevate manufacturing in XX priority sectors also helped spur a flurry of investments in biotechnology. Altogether, they unleashed a boom led by foreign-educated and -trained scientists and entrepreneurs.
“Not only is it now almost at parity with the US but it has that growth trajectory. It wouldn’t be sensationalist to suggest that China will overtake the US in the next few years purely in terms of numbers of drugs that it’s bringing through into its pipeline.”
Numbers aside, the more stunning leap is in the quality of Chinese biotech innovation. While there's constant debate in the pharmaceutical industry on whether Chinese firms are capable of producing not just effective but needle-shifting new therapies, there's growing recognition on multiple fronts. The world’s strictest regulatory agencies, including 🇺🇸 FDA and the European Medicines Agency, increasingly view Chinese drugs as generally promising enough to justify devoting extra resources to speed up their review, handing them coveted industry designations such as priority review, breakthrough therapy designation or fast track status.
The country is now slightly ahead of the EU in earning such expedited reviews as of 2024, a remarkable edge over a region that previously produced drugs like Wegovy.
One of the early exemplars of Chinese innovation is a cell therapy that has shown promise to potentially cure a deadly blood cancer. First developed in China by 🇨🇳 Legend Biotech Corp, it is now marketed by Johnson & Johnson — having won a few expedited review designations along the way — and considered superior to a competing US-originated therapy.
Still, the absolute number of China-originated drugs winning these designations trail their US counterparts by a large margin.
Risk-aversion remains a factor holding back Chinese pharmaceutical innovation: So far, top companies tend to focus on making better versions of existing therapies or new iterations of older ideas, and few are pioneering novel treatment approaches that have never been tried before — an endeavor that comes with a high risk of failure and is still led by the US, Europe and, to a lesser extent, Japan.
Nevertheless, the biggest Chinese breakthroughs are increasingly being snapped up by pharmaceutical giants for record sums.
A novel cancer drug from Akeso, which came out more effective than Merck & Co’s Keytruda in a Chinese study last year, has been likened to China biotech’s DeepSeek moment. The promise of topping Keytruda, the world’s top-selling drug, also swelled the valuation of Summit Therapeutics Inc, which in 2022 paid $500M upfront for the development and marketing rights in the US and other regions.
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XXXXX engagements
