[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 41.1K followers Created: 2025-07-14 14:03:07 UTC Other multinational players like Merck, AstraZeneca Plc and Roche Holding AG have also scooped up Chinese assets. In May, Pfizer Inc. set a new record as it announced a $1.2B upfront deal with 3SBio Inc for a cancer drug similar to Akeso’s. These deals are increasing in both value and frequency, signaling confidence that China-originated drugs are competitive internationally and can bring in substantial revenue. The volume of potential candidates coming out of China means multinational companies, who have a constant need to add new products to the mix, can “cast their net wider than ever before.” A key advantage that has fueled the rise of Chinese biotech firms is their ability to conduct research cheaper and faster at every step of the way, from lab experiments and animal testing to human trials. Creating a new drug from scratch is notoriously time-consuming and expensive, and China's massive patient pool and centralized hospital network have become a significant accelerator. An analysis of the time taken for drugs to conduct various testing stages shows that doctors in China can recruit for trials much faster — for early trials for cancer and obesity drugs, they can complete patient enrollment in half the time compared to the US. The difference in costs means Chinese companies can afford to run multiple trials simultaneously to find a winner, or quickly launch new projects once a scientific idea is validated by other groups. Since 2021, China has become the top location for clinical research, initiating the largest number of new trials globally. To be sure, clinical data in China is just a start. US regulators have made it clear that China-only trial results, no matter how positive, are not sufficient to support drug approvals. Chinese biotechs with ambition to sell their drugs overseas must prove that their treatment benefits can be replicated in non-Chinese patients, through complex and slower-moving global studies. It may still be a few years before a critical mass of drugs sourced from China wins US and EU approvals — the gold standard for high-quality treatments — and become widely used in the Western world, but many in the industry believe that's inevitable. China’s innovators comprise both cutting-edge biotech startups founded by foreign-educated entrepreneurs, and old-guard Chinese pharmaceutical companies like Jiangsu Hengrui Pharmaceuticals Co, which used to be one of the country’s biggest generic drugmakers. The company poured billions of dollars into shifting to innovative R&D after Beijing’s campaign to lower generic drug prices made that sector less profitable. It's now the world's top-ranked pharmaceutical company for the number of new innovative drugs added to the research pipeline in the period of 2020-2024. Of the XX companies that generated the highest number of innovative drug candidates between 2020 and 2024, XX of them were Chinese, compared to X in the five years before. The growth of China’s biotech ecosystem is causing alarm among some American politicians and business leaders. A congressional commission warned that the US risks losing its leadership position in yet another industry critical to national security. In addition to economic implications and possible military applications of biotech, China’s leverage on innovative therapies may be weaponized in a future conflict if Americans become dependent on those medicines. 2/n XXXXX engagements  **Related Topics** [$1530hk](/topic/$1530hk) [$12b](/topic/$12b) [wan](/topic/wan) [$mrk](/topic/$mrk) [stocks healthcare](/topic/stocks-healthcare) [$azn](/topic/$azn) [$pfe](/topic/$pfe) [Post Link](https://x.com/Byron_Wan/status/1944759568594292978)
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Byron Wan @Byron_Wan on x 41.1K followers
Created: 2025-07-14 14:03:07 UTC
Other multinational players like Merck, AstraZeneca Plc and Roche Holding AG have also scooped up Chinese assets. In May, Pfizer Inc. set a new record as it announced a $1.2B upfront deal with 3SBio Inc for a cancer drug similar to Akeso’s. These deals are increasing in both value and frequency, signaling confidence that China-originated drugs are competitive internationally and can bring in substantial revenue.
The volume of potential candidates coming out of China means multinational companies, who have a constant need to add new products to the mix, can “cast their net wider than ever before.”
A key advantage that has fueled the rise of Chinese biotech firms is their ability to conduct research cheaper and faster at every step of the way, from lab experiments and animal testing to human trials.
Creating a new drug from scratch is notoriously time-consuming and expensive, and China's massive patient pool and centralized hospital network have become a significant accelerator.
An analysis of the time taken for drugs to conduct various testing stages shows that doctors in China can recruit for trials much faster — for early trials for cancer and obesity drugs, they can complete patient enrollment in half the time compared to the US.
The difference in costs means Chinese companies can afford to run multiple trials simultaneously to find a winner, or quickly launch new projects once a scientific idea is validated by other groups.
Since 2021, China has become the top location for clinical research, initiating the largest number of new trials globally.
To be sure, clinical data in China is just a start. US regulators have made it clear that China-only trial results, no matter how positive, are not sufficient to support drug approvals. Chinese biotechs with ambition to sell their drugs overseas must prove that their treatment benefits can be replicated in non-Chinese patients, through complex and slower-moving global studies.
It may still be a few years before a critical mass of drugs sourced from China wins US and EU approvals — the gold standard for high-quality treatments — and become widely used in the Western world, but many in the industry believe that's inevitable.
China’s innovators comprise both cutting-edge biotech startups founded by foreign-educated entrepreneurs, and old-guard Chinese pharmaceutical companies like Jiangsu Hengrui Pharmaceuticals Co, which used to be one of the country’s biggest generic drugmakers.
The company poured billions of dollars into shifting to innovative R&D after Beijing’s campaign to lower generic drug prices made that sector less profitable. It's now the world's top-ranked pharmaceutical company for the number of new innovative drugs added to the research pipeline in the period of 2020-2024.
Of the XX companies that generated the highest number of innovative drug candidates between 2020 and 2024, XX of them were Chinese, compared to X in the five years before.
The growth of China’s biotech ecosystem is causing alarm among some American politicians and business leaders. A congressional commission warned that the US risks losing its leadership position in yet another industry critical to national security.
In addition to economic implications and possible military applications of biotech, China’s leverage on innovative therapies may be weaponized in a future conflict if Americans become dependent on those medicines.
2/n
XXXXX engagements
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