October 31, 2025 • 43 mins
China is setting a new bar for the speed of clinical development and redefining the time it takes an asset to get to the clinic. On a special edition of the BioCentury This Week podcast recorded on stage at the 12th BioCentury BayHelix China Healthcare Summit in Shanghai, BioCentury's Simone Fishburn argued that China’s emerging new standard for swift entry to the clinic could upend the bottleneck of translational development and usher in a new paradigm that could have a “massive impact globally.”
Fishburn and her BioCentury colleagues Joshua Berlin and Jeff Cranmer were joined by a trio of cross-border KOLs — John Zhu, CEO of antibody-drug conjugate company DualityBio; Matt Hewitt, CTO of Charles River Laboratories' manufacturing business division; and Bing Wang, CFO of Akeso — to discuss the speed of generating first-in-human data, Innovent’s $1.2 billion deal with Takeda, an evolving biotech talent pool, and the state of the financial markets.
“For me, it really feels like 2025 is the year that biotech globally woke up to China,” Fishburn said.
BioCentury returns to Asia early next year for the 5th East-West Summit, March 9-11 in Seoul. Register today as a delegate or apply to join the Presenting Company Class to take advantage of early bird rates.
#ChinaInnovation #DrugDevelopment #PharmaDeals #GlobalBiotech #PharmaInnovation #siRNA #BrainToVein
00:00 - Introduction
02:49 - China Speed
12:27 - Clinical Trails
17:34 - Global Strategy
26:59 - Financial Markets IPOs
36:52 - Talent
To submit a question to BioCentury’s editors, email the BioCentury This Week team at podcasts@biocentury.com.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
[AI-generated transcript.]
Jeff Cranmer (00:02):
Welcome to a special edition of the
BioCentury This Week podcast.
Today we are coming to you fromone of the most active biotech
hubs in the world, Shanghai.
On today's podcast, we willdeliver the key takeaways from
the 12th annual BioCenturyBayHelix China Healthcare
(00:23):
Summit with our specialguests, Matt Hewitt, VP
and CTO of Charles RiversManufacturing Business Division.
We have Bing Wang, CFOof China, biotech kind of
high flying China biotechAkeso, and we have.
John Zhu of Duality Biologics.
(00:44):
He's the CEO of this companythat got the current wave of
biotech IPOs rolling on theHong Kong Stock Exchange.
late last year, I think itwas from the BioCentury side.
We have the illustriousSimone Fishburn
Simone F (01:01):
illustrious this week.
Okay.
Jeff Cranmer (01:02):
Our editor in chief, vice President.
And notorious WashingtonCommanders fan, Josh Berlin,
who's actually the man behindthe curtain of all of our
conferences, as you heard,at the beginning of today,
Simone Fishburn (01:16):
and I'm gonna, I'm gonna go, I think
he is the heart and soul ofthe China Healthcare Summit.
I, it's the heart and soul.
Heart and souls.
Josh Berlin (01:22):
Tough, tough, uh, bar there.
But I'll, I'll get, this isthe nice, they called worse.
Simone Fishburn (01:26):
This is the nicest we're
ever gonna be, Josh.
So take it, you know.
Jeff Cranmer (01:29):
All right.
Well, you may have heardthe term China speed.
Has anybody heardthat term before?
Yeah.
Simone Fishburn (01:35):
Yeah.
China speed.
Jeff Cranmer (01:36):
Well, buckle up, few of us just toward,
the Zhangjiang Science Park.
me for the first time, uh,we're top biopharmas from
around the world and aroundChina, have set up shop, and
I'm here to tell you that.
Clinical trials in Chinaare getting even faster,
if you can believe that.
(01:57):
So we'll talk the acceleratingpace of clinical development.
On today's podcast, we'llalso talk about Innovent's
$1.2 billion deal with Takedaand why the move is a giant
step toward global innovationfor the Suzhou company.
And green shoots in thefinancing market are coming
(02:20):
in the form of capital flowingagain here in China in an IPO
market, as I just mentionedin Hong Kong, that's kind of
leaving NASDAQ in the dustwhen it comes to IPOs at least.
None of this, of course, couldhappen without talent, and I'm
looking around the room hereand I see a lot of talent.
We'll discuss how China'stalent pool is rapidly evolving,
(02:44):
and we'll also talk about thedirection of biotech innovation.
Simone, let's start withaccelerating clinical trials.
Uh, what have youlearned this week?
What have you seen?
Simone Fishburn (02:57):
Right.
So, you know, for context,I wasn't on that tour
just to stipulate that.
but I heard great things aboutit, and you're gonna talk
about it in a minute, maybe.
but, you know, sitting througha really extraordinary couple of
days of panels, some take homesthat we got, well, I think it's
very well known inside Chinaand our message really is to.
(03:20):
People in the otherecosystems, the U.S.
and Europe, Really understandingwhat an impact is gonna have
globally, the way that clinicaltrial and clinical trial starts
or accelerating in China.
China is really settinga new bar for this.
we are seeing, you know,one of the most important,
perhaps underrecognizedin the west, moves.
(03:42):
That was by Esobiotec whowere in Europe trying to get
things done on very littlemoney and realizing that
the way to do that for themwas to come and run their
clinical trial in China.
And in a very shortamount of time.
And what did we talk aboutwith like four patients
or fewer even, you know,maybe even fewer than that.
(04:03):
They flipped that intoa deal with AstraZeneca.
And so, you know, my, my feelingreally is that China's setting
a new bar, we're seeing the U.K.
set itself new standards forreverting to what it used to do.
And going beyond that in termsof accelerating clinical trials.
And we all know that this reallyis the biggest bottleneck.
(04:25):
In drug development is goingfrom discovery into humans.
I mean that is, that isthe bit that takes forever
and where, you know, yourfailure rates are very high.
And so if you can reallybend the curve on how long
it takes you to get wellin speeding up, getting
that human clinical data.
You can really start tochange the paradigm and I,
(04:46):
I personally think that thatmight be where China has a
massive impact globally.
So those are mythoughts on that.
Do you wanna pickit up from there?
Bing Wang (04:53):
Sure.
Thank you Simone.
I think.
You nailed it.
I think having Jean-Pierreon the stage, um, yesterday
was a, a perfect example ofthe integration of China's
innovation in the global stage.
Here is a very scrappyentrepreneur, have much
lower resources thancompared to some of the U.S.
California and Boston Biotech.
Simone Fishburn (05:13):
C Can I just interrupt, say.
Just for the audience, thisis Jean-Pierre Latere, the
CEO of EsoBiotec, right?
Bing Wang (05:17):
Yes.
Thank you.
Yes, John Pierre Issa Biotech.
Um, so, you know, very scrappy,very talented entrepreneur.
Really made themuch smaller raise.
I think he, he did noteven break, uh, 20.
Million euros in terms of histotal raise and he was able
to get a lot accomplishedwith that capital, right?
Comparable to some of thebigger, without naming names,
(05:38):
some of the bigger U.S. in vivoCAR T companies, and able to
create enough data from bothtranslational quality of the
vectors as well as some humandata to get AstraZeneca, says,
we feel pretty de-risk aboutthis platform and actually
did very, very well for hisproduct, for his platform,
and for his investors,and I think that story.
(05:59):
Really nailed it in terms of thelast two days of how China is
part of the global system today.
Simone Fishburn (06:04):
So I actually, I wanna take it a step further
and play to my internalcrowd here and a couple of
compliments within this.
I think there are certaintimes and certain deals, quite
often events that some peopleat the time recognized their
importance going forward.
Others take longer.
You could look at the Legenddeal with J&J as a really
(06:25):
seminal deal for understandingthe value of China innovation.
I think what you've just pointedto many people may have have
whiffed on that, but that dealthat EsoBiotec did and then
getting bought, I would sayAkeso itself has certainly
made a massive splash in termsof making people understand.
Wow.
I mean, that just changedthe whole paradigm.
(06:46):
And obviously you've got a lotof followers there, Duality
doing similar things, andyou know what you've done.
Like the IPO recently is like,oh wait, wait, things are
actually happening and the,the boldness of doing that.
And so I think thatthere are more stories
coming out of China.
That we're able to lookat globally and say maybe
that was the point atwhich the trajectory took
(07:08):
a slightly different termup and up and it's the
accumulation of these things.
As said, everybody who's comingto the China conference, Josh,
you can pick it up for me in aminute, but we've been coming to
this China conference for years.
We've known it for years, butfor me it really feels like
2025 is the year that biotechglobally woke up to China.
But it's had all thesemarkers all the way along.
Josh Berlin (07:28):
Yeah, I, I totally agree with that.
Uh, Simone and we had a, atremendous number of folks
out this week in Shanghai.
lot of our western friends,both from Europe and the U.S.
who had not been out toChina, before, hadn't
been out frequently.
And I think some of it is thedeal flow that everybody's
reading about, it'salmost, um, a deal of the
(07:49):
week, kind of news flow.
And we obviously saw the, thehuge deal, uh, this week that,
um, sort of coincided with the,uh, the launch of the event,
the Innovent, uh, Takeda deal.
that news flow, Ithink has become almost
impossible to ignore.
And I think even those who mighthave, um, sort of discounted,
uh, what was happening in China.
(08:09):
You know, even a, a yearago, are now, reassessing
and trying to understand.
What's happening out here, andalso whether there might be
opportunities for them, muchlike, EsoBiotec, example, we
had quite a few European andWestern VCs out this week.
Also looking, I think, onbehalf of their portfolio
companies, they were out here.
(08:30):
Also, I think looking forpotentially NewCos and other,
ways to access innovation,but also thinking about.
How, their own portfoliocompanies in the West might
be able to, also accelerate,R&D and accelerate, proof
of concept by perhaps,um, leveraging, China.
Jeff Cranmer (08:48):
Yeah, we had the managing director of Google
Ventures out, I think it was
Simone Fishburn (08:53):
Krishna.
Jeff Cranmer (08:53):
Yeah, Krishna.
I think it was his first timeout, if I remember correct.
And we're gonna dig into the inevent deal in, in just a moment.
but I want to go over to Matt.
get U.S. back to thespeed of the trials.
And Matt, he doesn'tlive in Shanghai, but
he's here all the time.
Matt, from your perspective,what do you see?
Matthew Hewitt (09:13):
Yeah, I mean, I think for us you
know, playing in, in a lot ofthe therapeutic development
side, what we see is that.
Companies in general, regardlessof modality, are, are truly
searching for an environmentwhich colloquially we would
call it a fast test, fast fail.
So it's importantto get to clinic as
efficiently as possible.
And then once you get toclinic, it's important to get
(09:34):
that, if we wanna call it valueinflection point data, that
that tells you whether or nota a, an asset or a program
has a, a chance at success,whether it's going to late
phase or potentially goingto commercial at some point.
And over the last, fromwhat I've seen, seven, eight
years here in China, I mean,things have really matured
and that's been from multipleperspectives, whether it's
(09:57):
the IIT design, the kind ofrelaunch, uh, of the regulatory
framework and from NMPA.
and, and you know, we have alot of talent that's been coming
back to China and we, I knowwe'll talk about that soon.
But point being is, is thatthe framework here has been
streamlined such that youcan move assets through
much, uh, very efficiently.
(10:17):
And it has woken up, Ithink, other parts of the
world as well as to thatthis is now, beginning to
look like a trendsetter.
Simone Fishburn (10:25):
Can I just quickly follow up to ask you
to, um, elaborate on somethingthat we discussed earlier,
which is, you know, we talkedwhen I did a story a few
months ago about how differentregulatory agencies across
the world are looking at riskdifferently and how that is
actually changing the paceof getting into the clinic.
Can you just
Matthew Hewitt (10:45):
Yeah.
Sure.
Simone Fishb (10:45):
Elaborate on that?
Matthew Hewitt (10:46):
Yeah, so in the past we've kind of talked about
what's phase appropriate for.
companies as they're movingproducts through development
in, into, into clinical, inthe U.S. as an example, we
typically divide things intoearly and late phase clinical.
Uh, and depending on themodality, it's either phase one
or it's phase one or phase two.
And it really depends uponwhen you're going into a
(11:08):
potentially pivotal phase.
I think what we have kindof re termed that this year
is, is it's not really phaseappropriate, but it's risk
appropriate because that's howthe regulators view the world.
They don't view theworld through data.
They view theworld through risk.
And so the ideas is thatthe regulators are looking
for a path that is mostefficient, where you can,
(11:30):
uh, provide the highestquality product or therapy to
patients at the lowest risk.
I think what we've seen hereis, is that, there's been a.
a very collaborative approachto understanding what the
proper, risk is for each phaseso that we can move things very
efficiently and so we can tryto provide patients with cutting
edge therapies that they need.
Bing Wang (11:51):
I think what was very helpful last few days,
you hear from Li Chen at Hua,you heard it from funding from
McKinsey, that the governmenthere is very, very responsive
and we actually iterate with theindustry and how to make things
better from both translation.
from both an IND process,clinical, all the way to, they
even talked about a, a novelway of, of, you know, beyond
the NRDL, how to actuallyget this to patients to just
(12:13):
additional way of paying.
So I think the government hereis very, very responsive to
the needs of the industry.
Jeff Cranmer (12:18):
Hmm.
And, and thanks.
Thanks Bing I, I wannaget the names out there.
So our listeners whoaren't with us here in
the room, and, and Mattappreciated the points there.
I wanna bring John intothe conversation now.
So for those who of youwho might not be familiar
with Duality, uh, you mightbe living under a rock.
I was gonna say that, that
Simone Fishburn (12:38):
three people out there who have
been spent the last twoyears in the desert, maybe
Jeff Cranmer (12:42):
someone, uh, yeah.
Someone out there may nothave heard, but for those
of you, uh, as I mentioned,the IPO, one of the top
dealmaking China biotechs, Ithink four deals all for ADCs.
so you're in the clinic,from where you sit, what
are you seeing evolvewith clinical trials?
John Zhu (13:02):
Yeah.
First of all, we wentIPO, uh, April this
year, so Oh, was April.
April, 15th to be exact.
Wow.
And, um, I still rememberwhen we go to Hong Kong
for the road show, which isApril 7th, that's exactly
the, uh, trade war happens.
And Hong Kong Hang Seng Indexwas down like 15% in one day.
(13:23):
And, uh.
was think I were crazybecause we want to do
the, I remember everyone
Simone Fi (13:27):
going, that was bold.
Wow.
You know?
Jeff Cranmer (13:30):
Yeah.
Yeah.
So that's, so sorryI got the time wrong.
I mean, China speed is so fast.
If I may borrow a linefrom Stephen Wright,
it's like putting instantcoffee in a microwave
and going back in time.
But John, yeah, and
John Zhu (13:43):
that's, and and yes.
So we, have about six deals.
total deal sizeis 6 billion U.S.
dollar.
And that, um, from paymentand, uh, new milestones,
we collect, uh, more than5 million U.S. dollars.
So we, we did get cash wecan really can help us to
survive for, for a while.
And, uh, talk abouta clinical trial.
(14:03):
this is one of our visionfrom day one, become a
global bio pharma by globalmeaning that we really want
to, for patients global.
And, uh, we wanna builda global clinical team
and a global product.
So, not long.
We have about little bitmore than 200 employees.
(14:24):
About 30 of them are in U.S.
So by the global trial, which Imeans really MRCT from day one.
the downside is that actuallyis actually more costly to
do clinical trial in U.S.
as you, as you can tell.
but, we feel that because wewant to become a global bio
pharma, it's really, we haveto demonstrate the efficacy and
(14:46):
the safety in global patients,including U.S. patients.
And, talk about the speedup the clinical trial.
To be honest, the sentencingyou cannot do, right?
I mean, you have togive drug to patients.
They have to go throughcycle one, cycle two, right.
The sentencing, you, youjust have to respect the law.
(15:06):
Of course, you have torespect the quality.
why, why think likeChinese biotech?
We are faster if youthink about that, right?
I think the reason why we'refaster is that sometimes
we can cut the, what,what we call white space.
Just give one example, right.
we deliver the IND fromIND to first patient.
(15:28):
Some company take like threemonths or four months, and
they think it's normal.
We think it's not normal.
We take like, onemonth, you know, 45 days
first patient, right?
And, uh, from our first patientto end of Phase II meeting.
20 months and people thinkit'll take like three
years and four years longmonths, we think 20 months.
(15:49):
So we do work hard.
We can cut some waste space.
But in the end, Jeff, I thinkmost important thing is that
you need to have a clearclinical strategy that's
most important, really solve,uh, unmet medical needs.
That's number one.
And number two, youreally have to understand.
Both the U.S. practiceand the China practice,
(16:10):
and sometimes there aresynergy between each other.
In China, for example,enrollment is actually
indeed faster.
So currently we have, youknow, more than 2,700 patients
worldwide, 50% of them areactually X China, including U.S.
and Australia.
But the China patientsactually helps a lot.
(16:31):
Right.
So when design MRCT, that'sthe beauty of MRCT instead
doing China only, orU.S. on only, you are not
helping each other, right?
Just give one example.
we have a partnershipwith BioNTech for a
HER2 ADC TROP2 and ADC.
Just give one example regardingADC which is a really good
(16:51):
target expressed in multipletumors, including small
cell lung cancer, CRPC.
HCC, cervical cancer.
Our first patient is 2023,July at the time Daiichi way
ahead of us have us now weload more than 600 patient.
We're showing indications, youknow, for example, in other, in
(17:11):
like HCC cervical cancer showsignals even ahead of Daiichi.
So let's talk aboutthe, China speed.
I'll stop here.
Yeah,
Simone Fishburn (17:19):
so, so I wanna actually follow up
to, to both of you guys withsomething that you said there,
which is that you said that.
from day one you decidedto be a global biotech, and
I don't know if Akeso hasmade that same decision.
it does bring usback to the in Innovent story
and what was notable reallyin that deal mean you, you
(17:40):
might wanna talk about alittle bit also, is the, is the
fact that they retained 40%.
Rights to 40% of the, well bothcosts and, profits in the U.S.
And I am wondering whether thismold, which (BeiGene) BeOne has
really been the pioneer of, interms of starting, like being
a China-based company thatstarted with a global outlook.
(18:01):
And if you think that we'regonna have more and more
China companies that have thatglobal way of, of thinking,
can you, can you talk alittle bit about that and
whether it's what the, theimportance of the Innovent deal?
Bing Wang (18:13):
I, I think that was a very good deal for both parties.
Um, I think in particular,the fact that they're made a
deal with Takeda as opposedto being, you know, U.S.
pharma was, wasactually quite notable.
But I, I will say this,Innovent is not your
typical China biotech.
Simone Fishburn (18:26):
Mm-hmm.
Bing Wang (18:26):
Right.
There's probably.
Three or four companiesof size, right.
BeOne, Innovent ourselvesAkeso, maybe Coen, you know,
where we have the balancesheet and the capabilities
to be be to do that.
Simone Fishburn (18:39):
Mm-hmm.
Bing Wang (18:40):
I think Innovent did a very, very good job in China
commercializing their product.
But this is not truefor most biotech.
Just like in the U.S. a lotof biotech don't have the
resources, so they wouldactually take more capital
and give away more later term.
Simone Fishburn (18:52):
I'm not sure how many.
U.S. biotechs set themselvesup and say, I'm gonna
be a global biotech.
Bing Wang (18:59):
Yeah.
But I think to add to thatpoint, and I think, Simone, you
brought up a very good example.
I think the firstcompany to really do
this is actually Legend.
And the, the reason that you canget this type of leverage, and
I wanna highlight the Legend asa really good example, Carvykti
was really the first casewhere a product, a therapy that
come from China, fundamentallychanged global standard of care.
(19:22):
Right, because here wetalked about innovation.
We talk about China's speed, wetalk about efficient capital,
but end of the day, can amolecule that came out of China,
change standard of care forevery human being on earth.
That's what we hopeto do at Akeso, with
Ivonescimab, by the way.
Right?
And obviously with a biggertotal addressable market for
lung cancer, multiple myeloma.
But I think Legendreally pioneered that.
(19:42):
And I think that needsto be emphasized.
And I think, looking atthe long game, right?
can our product changestandard care for every
human being on earth?
That confidence and then theresources behind it, which
Innovent has their, their,you know, significant market
cap, significant balancesheet, significant P&L
in China to support that.
That's what allowed themto do the deal with Takeda,
(20:03):
with those structure.
Jeff Cranmer (20:04):
And that's of course Legends deal with Johnson
and Johnson, for a CAR T I sawMatt wanting to jump in there.
Matt, what are your thoughtson the Innovent deal?
Matthew Hewitt (20:13):
Uh, well I was just gonna comment more on
the, I mean, Innovent, but alsothe other comments around the
clinical trials, because we'veactually done some work around
this on looking at, how biotechsspecifically in the U.S. set
up, you know, clinical programsand what's important to them.
it's single, usuallysingle center, maybe two
or three center clinicaltrials within one geo.
(20:34):
And in fact, we've askedthe question of various
biotechs in the U.S. are youthinking about other geos?
And the answer is always no,because they're not thinking
about it until they get throughalmost a BLA filing before they
start thinking about other geos.
So I think that is somewhatunique that something we see
here in China, to John's pointthat, you know, where you're
(20:56):
gonna see, um, these China,China biotechs really take on
some multiple geos at the sametime, even simultaneously, even
if we're talking about Chinain Australia, where, you know,
with TGA it's quite acceptingof, of new, uh, trials.
There's, there's varioustax credits that are there.
you've got well-defined patientpopulations with a lot of the
population being sequenced,even in different, even in
(21:18):
different states in Australia.
But then of course, then you'realways looking at the U.S.
because generally, even if it's,it's not really reciprocity,
but there will be one way.
recognition of like a U.S.
IND by China, by Australia,that minimizes your need to
do additional activities toset up clinical activities.
Josh Berlin (21:37):
Yeah, man, I, I wanted to ask you something.
So, you know, I took a fewmeetings, uh, this week when
I wasn't on, uh, stage ordoing things in this room and.
with a few China biotechs.
I won't, name and are um,much earlier stage than, uh,
than John or Bing's company.
But, um, you know, sat througha couple of presentations with
them and one thing that wasstruck me, was, that several
(21:59):
companies, rather than sayingsort of proof of concept,
which I hear, you know, youhear so much in the U.S.
where instead sayingproof of signal.
That, that that's whatthey were trying to get.
They were trying to get to proofof signal so that they could,
essentially use early data toattract, potential partners.
So I, I don't know ifyou, you know, what, what
you think about that.
Matthew Hewitt (22:17):
Yeah, I mean we, we do have that structure,
I would say within the U.S.
and Europe, but we classicallycall it like phase zeros or kind
of looking glass trials where,we'll, similar to EsoBiotec
did here, you know, with those2, 3, 4 patients and then
look for some efficacy signal.
depends on the modality,because many times you're
doing lead-in doses.
(22:38):
And, I think to John's point,I mean, I think the, the white
space that's optimized here thatenables you to do that is, is
one, kind of time to set up.
So, you know, within theU.S. and Europe, it can take
a year to activate a singleclinical site, whereas here.
It's, it's far, far shorter,let's just put it that way.
And then I think, you know,some of the other things that we
(23:00):
see on the clinical side aroundspacing out dosing required,
wait periods between dosingbetween patients, you know,
as much more minimized hereon our risk adjusted basis.
So, you know, we can speedthings up and get to that
signal much more quickly.
Jeff Cranmer (23:15):
Alright, we're uh, gonna go to a break shortly.
and then we'll come backand we'll talk about the.
talent, we're gonna talk aboutthe direction of innovation,
and we're gonna talk aboutthe financial markets.
so we'll take a quick breakand we'll be right back.
Alanna Farro (23:32):
BioCentury This Week is brought to you by
The 5th East-West BiopharmaSummit in South Korea.
An arc of innovation isemerging across Asia, and
Western biopharma leadersare taking note-from
cross-border deals to newcos.
In March, 2026, The 5thBioCentury-BayHelix East-West
BioPharma Summit visits SouthKorea for the first time.
(23:55):
Meet the biopharma leadersputting Korea innovation
on the global map.
Learn why Korea hasbecome a clinical trial
in manufacturing hub.
Discover if Korea is the nexthotspot for NewCo formation.
Plus, meet biopharmainnovators from India to
Singapore, to China and Japan.
Register now atBioCenturyEastWest.com.
Jeff Cranmer (24:19):
And we're back.
Simone, are, we've heard froma lot of our Indian colleagues
that they were a little pissedoff at Josh that he made
this meeting during Diwali.
Last year, Josh kind of gotme a little miffed 'cause he
made the meeting at Halloween.
Yeah.
But you know, if you move ita little earlier, not only
(24:40):
do you get to skip ESMO,which I'm sure everyone would
love, but it could be during.
Simone Fishburn (24:46):
So I, I wanna jump in here, Jeff.
And um, I think we haveto break it to Josh.
I've been.
Hinting to him for two daysthat there is this ground swell.
There is this like huge numberof people at this conference
who want this conferenceset during the Shanghai
Tennis Open next year, Josh.
So, you know, I'mgoing public with this.
(25:08):
And the, the pressure's on
Josh Berlin (25:10):
we're, we're working on it.
Simone Fishburn (25:12):
Most notably.
I think that was a yes, right?
I think I heard a yes.
Then
Jeff Cranmer (25:16):
most notably a young man named Alcaraz who has
an intense interest in biotech.
I understand.
You might wanna becomea stakeholder in a
Akeso or perhaps Duality
Simone Fishburn (25:26):
keynote speaker more likely.
Josh Berlin (25:27):
He could be a family office.
Maybe a family office play.
Jeff Cranmer (25:29):
And Simone, I also noticed you, you
had some interestinglooking socks on today.
You wanna tell us about
Simone Fishburn (25:34):
we're going this, I think,
I think you should.
I think you should startwith, Josh and Matt's socks.
Jeff Cranmer (25:39):
Oh my goodness.
Look at these things.
BioCentury's this week.
Podcast socks.
Josh Berlin (25:45):
Yes.
We need to give full creditto, uh, Brian Denker, who
was mentioned earlier forsourcing, a whole bunch
of, BioCentury's This Week,socks, this week, in Shanghai.
So if any, uh, of the listenerswanna a pair of socks, he should
try to track down Jeff or.
Simone at the next event.
Simone Fishburn (26:02):
You gotta come to a, you gotta come to a
live podcast to get the socks.
There's no, I, I wannato tell you something.
I was shamed at the lastconference when I had to go
with toenail color 'causeI didn't have the socks.
So I went out and boughtsome 'cause I was on
London on the way.
Some nice London socks here.
Josh Berlin (26:17):
Those are good..
Jeff Cranmer (26:17):
Well I'm, I'm paying respect to China here.
I got some dragon socks.
Oh.
Because, uh, yo that'swhat it's about.
Simone Fishburn (26:24):
They're a bit low res though.
They need to be more,
Jeff Cranmer (26:26):
They're low rise.
It's, uh, it's true.
I didn't have a lot of timebefore I got on the plane.
So you may have seen thatsign on some people's desks
that say, I'm silentlyjudging your grammar.
Has anyone seen that sign?
Maybe it's justan editor's thing.
Here at BioCentury's, whenyou're on a panel, we're
silently judging yoursocks and for being a good
(26:49):
sport and coming out today.
John, you've just won a pairof BioCentury This Week socks.
All right.
Alright, well let's turn tothe financial markets and hey,
we have a CFO on our panel.
So Bing, I'm gonna go to you.
what were you hearing this week?
Bing Wang (27:07):
I think, um, across different stages of capital.
I think earlier stage peopletalk about, NewCo formation
and, and, and how theythink about that, right?
I think, we have.
some experienced Chinese VCslike James Wang talk about it.
You know, it's anothersource of, funding assets.
But then we also had apanel that had some bankers
and, folks that are morelater stage in the capital.
(27:29):
you know, I think Bin Li atLake Bleu also talked about
this, that, you know, peopleare basically asking what is the
state of the Hong Kong market?
You know, I think a lotof people are saying
potentially there may be.
A correction, but itwouldn't be a bad thing.
I think people are stilloptimistic long term, but
maybe some near term volatilityis, is what we're hearing.
But definitely a lot offolks have seen that.
(27:50):
Um, biotech is, isum, is innovating.
I think end of the day this isno different than NASDAQ where
you know, you have to showthe data and so far I think,
um, the China biotechs have,have delivered on the data.
Simone Fishburn (28:02):
So
Jeff Cranmer (28:02):
We've seen, far more IPOs.
I forget the exact number,but far more IPOs have gotten
out on the Hong Kong exchange
Bing Wang (28:09):
Mm-hmm.
Jeff Cranmer (28:09):
than Nasdaq this year.
Bing Wang (28:10):
Yes.
Jeff Cranmer (28:11):
the key indexes in Hong Kong are way up.
Bing Wang (28:14):
Mm-hmm.
Jeff Cranmer (28:15):
John, uh, why was April the right time
for you guys to go out?
I don't, until you got out, Ithink it had been pretty quiet
John Zhu (28:22):
We're the first one.
Jeff Cranmer (28:23):
Yeah,
Josh Berlin (28:23):
you sort of caught the beginning of the wave there.
Yeah.
Simone Fishburn (28:25):
Well maybe they, I mean, caught the
beginning of the wave.
They created the wave.
Josh Berlin (28:29):
caused the wave.
Yeah.
John Zhu (28:30):
I think because we are crazy, so, so we
actually have a, um, longshow with investors in March.
It's actually, they'repretty about our asset.
Because we, we have assessthat have, global potential.
For example, our B73, wehave the opting we can
co-develop with BioNTech.
(28:52):
This is similar to like,uh, J&J's 19 Legend deal
co-development, and so manyU.S. long term investors.
They are very interestedin this story.
So I feel like, hmm,we might have a chance.
And then according toplan, so we we're going
to launch IPO April andthen hit the trade war.
So, but at that time, to behonest, we have not a choice.
(29:15):
We can back off, right.
And choose anotherpoint, but who knows
what's going to happen.
So we just, so sinceI'm crazy, I just go
out and do the IPO, so.
Simone Fishburn (29:25):
I wanna go back to your point.
I heard sort of acouple of themes.
Now you, what did, whatwas the word you, you used
the word correction, right?
And I think the wordsranged from bubble, it's
a bubble that will burst.
Bing Wang (29:39):
Try hard not to say that word.
Yes, you, you
Simone Fishburn (29:41):
tried, but other people said it.
Right.
And then there was frothy andthen there was correction.
And generally a feeling thatvaluations might be too high.
But still, I would say netnet, a positive kind of
sentiment that that things will.
Maintain in a, in a gooddirection is, is that, you
know, one was like, yes,we're outta the tunnel.
(30:03):
Like, is the light atthe end of the tunnel?
We're outta thetunnel kind of thing.
Bing Wang (30:07):
Yeah.
I think if, if I could commenton that maybe more broadly.
I think what we discovered thatinvestors all around the world.
Have no problem investingin the Hong Kong market.
It's a very robust market.
It's a very developed market.
You know, I think after NewYork, maybe after London,
you know, Hong Kong's a verydeveloped market that gives
people a lot of confidence inthe quality of the investors,
(30:30):
the quality of the regulatoryrequirement to be listed.
And then, you know, the qualityof the company's here, you
know, so, at Akeso we did a$250 million raise last October.
In August we did a$450 million raise.
Most of the investorsare overseas, right?
We have a lot of investorsthat came in from Europe.
We have some quitea bit from the U.S.
and obviously Singapore and,and other areas, but it's a very
(30:53):
international set of investorsthat came into our cap table.
So I think with that in mind,and obviously, you know,
we're of a, of a differentsize and many of the other
companies that recently listed,but I think good quality
companies can list in HongKong and don't feel like.
It's somehow a handicapped just'cause you're not on nasdaq.
So that is kind of the thingthat I would say I want to
(31:14):
emphasize is that the Hong Kongmarket is, is, is quite robust.
It's gonna have your up anddowns like any other market,
but we're attracting veryinternational European and
North American investorsin, into our cap table.
Josh Berlin (31:24):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Bing, I mean I, you know, Ithink for our U.S. listeners,
um, you know, the idea that it'sin a, a bubble or that there's
a, irrational exuberance.
It might be a, um.
A bit of a shock to folksthat haven't been following
the story this year.
But, you know, I had a fewdiscussions, uh, this week,
where, um, a discussion withone of the top, lawyers, uh,
(31:45):
in Hong Kong, as well as oneof the top bankers who both
told me independently thatthey were turning away work.
That they, they literallycouldn't handle the workload and
were turning away good clientsthat they would've normally
taken 'cause they were afraidthey couldn't deliver the work.
thought that was an interesting,take when, when the bankers are
turning awake, too much work,I won't use the word bubble,
(32:06):
but maybe there's somethinggoing, something going on.
Um, but there's alsoa, a long queue, right?
'cause you need to get approvedto go IPO in, in Hong Kong.
And there's, there's apretty long queue right now.
The wait was like,
Simone Fishburn (32:16):
what is it, six months or, I mean,
it's, it's a long wait.
Josh Berlin (32:18):
Yeah.
Simone Fishburn (32:19):
Yeah.
Six to eight months.
Can, can I pick up on somethingelse that you talked about?
Um, You talked about peoplerewarding innovation and
investors understanding that,tying that together because
that's sort of what I wanted to,pick up on as well in terms of
the thread, tying that together.
Let's go all the way back towhat you said about Legend,
setting a new standard.
You yourselves did that atAkeso with the Summit data
(32:42):
where you told the world, wait,we can actually be better.
Bing Wang (32:45):
I'm sorry.
Our data,
Simone Fishburn (32:47):
your data,
Bing Wang (32:47):
Our Akeso data.
Just be clear.
The, sorry.
Absolutely right.
The, the Akeso data rightin within the partnership,
but the Akeso data, um, thatgrabbed the attention of the
world because it could bebetter than Keytruda alone.
And so that was, I think formany people a turning point.
Meaning turning their heads tolook at, wait a minute, this
(33:09):
isn't just a fast followerstory and what we are now
starting to see is more whatwe call first order innovation.
So one of the themes that Iwanted to raise, Jeff, China
is known so well for, andwe heard this throughout the
last two days, its incredibleability to do anything
with an antibody fast andwhatever you want, right?
(33:30):
Can make it an ADC,a bispecific ADC.
You can make it a bispecific,you know, various things.
But one of the questionsthat came up is, is
it gonna start now?
Is the next wave gonna be siRNA?
So we heard that in severaldifferent threads and I
thought that was interesting.
Jeff Cranmer (33:43):
Yeah.
Well, um, I guess wealso heard a lot about,
Gene and cell therapy.
Uh, what was thenumber of programs?
Simone Fishburn (33:49):
Well, there was what the number that I
think you're thinking aboutis, I think Nisa said there
are 130 in vivo CAR T programs.
Jeff Cranme (33:57):
Yeah, that's right.
thought that siRNA wouldbe Comparable to that.
Quickly.
Uh, Matt, from where you sit,where do you see the direction
of innovation going, in China?
Matthew Hewitt (34:09):
Yeah, I mean, I, coming back to the cell and
gene therapy numbers, I mean,we, we track those via several
consortia that we're a part of.
And generally still, I wouldsay that the U.S. is first
still in assets and trials.
I, China has been very, veryquickly catching up though,
and is definitely nippingat the heels of, of the U.S.
and certainly I think we'reseeing that speed up now.
(34:31):
and then we're seeing alot of the kind of seminal
platforms and nucleic acidsaround siRNA, but other nucleic
acid platforms in general.
and they're coming upto the point where there
can be some additionalinnovation done to them.
I think it's, uh, youknow, given the experience,
and the track record thatChina and the innovators
here have in antibodies.
(34:52):
It is, you know, a ripearea for further innovation
and optimization.
we've got some really good,uh, de-risking in terms of
clinical assets that have gone,gone on to become commercial
and then in, in multiple geos.
You know, they'veworked out pretty well.
The, uh, um, I, we didn'ttouch on this earlier, but
another thing that it canbe a difficulty is getting
(35:12):
clinicians comfortable witha new modality and, and then
giving it to patients orprescribing it for patients.
I know within advancedtherapies we always talk
about vein to vein time.
But the actual term that westarted using lately is brain
to vein, because that's whenthe clinicians will actually
start prescribing them to thepatients in large numbers,
which is ultimately what theterms, uh, commercial success.
(35:33):
So I think that coupledwith, you know, kind of the
familiarity of regulatorsand reimbursement strategies
is gonna be, you know,present a pretty nice,
uh, opportunity there.
Jeff Cranmer (35:43):
we're, kind of coming up on time and I, we,
I do want to get to talent,but John, I really do wanna
get your take as sort of beingat the forefront of ADCs.
what are you excited about?
What are you kind ofhearing about bubbling up?
Just, just real quick.
John Zhu (35:57):
Real quick.
Actually, one year ago I said,uh, something that's actually,
at that time it's very radical.
In BioCentury forum, Isaid watch out, Chinese
biotech is coming.
Because biotech is biologyplus technology and the Chinese
biotech, you know, we'revery strong in engineering.
This year, I'm gonna sayslightly different point.
(36:19):
I think the boundarybetween biology, we'll
talk about target, right?
And the technology, when we talkabout the ADCs linker payload,
it's actually become blurredbecause if you have a strong
technology, so you can reallyhelp you validate your biology.
Actually you can speedup, speed up your science
and therefore have a trueinnovation like a PD-1, or VEGF.
(36:40):
I'm not sure that'sbiology or engineering.
We talk about bispecificsbut the the boundaries broad.
In summary, I think thetrue innovation will come
out from Chinese biotech.
Simone Fishb (36:50):
I agree with that.
Jeff Cranmer (36:52):
Alright, well, talent is shifting.
That's one thing Ilearned this week.
Back in the day, the leadersof China, biotech companies,
10 years ago, they werereturnees the so-called sea
turtles who they went toget their PhD in the U.S.
They worked at Novartis,J&J, you name it.
(37:13):
They came back, they foundedcompanies and I was talking
to Vince Deng this week,who was at Med-Fine Capital.
And, and he started anew fund a few years ago.
And he said for him, he waslike, Hey, I'm gonna look
at the person who was numbertwo, number three, number
four, working for one ofthese returnees and w ork with
(37:35):
them to set up a new company.
And so that, that wasinteresting to me.
I, what, what have youbeen hearing, Simone?
Simone Fishburn (37:40):
Yeah, I mean, thi this came up, I had a
conversation with Kevin Li.
It also came up on, on thepanel, the scene setter panel.
And so definitely thisgeneration, I'm gonna call
it our generation, youknow, in China, those,
those folks, it, it wasstandard to go to the U.S.
get your training, get yourcredibility, and come, and
you, you know, those peoplethen came back to China
(38:01):
and that's been the mantra.
In fact, that's beenthe mantra globally.
It was the mantra in theU.K. and, and Europe as well.
And what I'm hearingis that this emerging
generation in China.
Of, you know, maybe the nextleaders, they don't feel that
they have to go to the U.S.
in order to get the training.
And I think, Matt, you made thepoint earlier when we talked
(38:22):
that they may still get thetraining of how things are done.
Now in China by working fromMNCs inside China and or as
you point Jeff, working forpeople who've done that.
The point that I was making wasthat that generation doesn't
feel the need to go to the U.S.
They'll be more domesticallygenerated, you know, talent and
(38:45):
the analogy was like, there wasGenentech, and then Genentech
spawned a whole number of,uh, you know, other companies.
Matt looks like youwanna respond to that.
Matthew Hewitt (38:53):
That.
I mean, I, I, I'll probablylike reiterate what I said this
morning, which was that, I mean,to your story, Jeff, I mean, how
did that fund find those people?
They went to the people thattrained in the U.S. I mean,
that's the starting point,
Jeff Cranmer (39:05):
Right.
Matthew Hewitt (39:05):
and it's not to say that.
I mean, it's gonna evolvefrom that point, but the
starting point remains thatthe only way they're finding
those people is by finding thepeople that went and trained
in the U.S. and came back.
So if we start from thatanchor, if you will.
Then certainly you can iterateupon that and then, you know,
there's gonna be subsequent,generations so to speak
(39:26):
of talent that are, don'tneed to then go to the U.S.
but have the pedigree oftraining under our folks.
And I think coming to backto John's point around,
taking more global outlookas a Chinese biotech.
I mean, to me that happensfrom this first generation of
talent that trained in the U.S.
came back, has the experienceof global, commercialization
versus local commercialization.
(39:48):
And if you look at a lot ofthe U.S. biotechs, like I said
before, I mean, I'll say thereason why a lot of those U.S.
biotechs focus on U.S. only,is it because a lot of times
those folks only know how tocommercialize in the U.S. They
don't necessarily know howto commercialize in China.
They don't know how tocommercialize in Japan.
Korea anywhere here in APAC.
So, I mean, I think it givesU.S. a kind of a, a really
good, uh, legitimacy to theChinese biotech scene that
(40:11):
they've got a more globaloutlook on the talent.
Simone Fishburn (40:14):
Can we get your thoughts on this as well?
You know, running a company?
Yeah.
And what are you seeing?
Bing Wang (40:18):
Well, we definitely see a mix, right?
So at Akeso, a lot of the, thesenior management have, you
know, overseas experience, youknow, myself included, but.
I would say the next layer down,right, the VPs and the directors
are, are all mostly domestic,talent and trained some of
them at other China biotechs,some of them at multinationals.
Um, I think, uh, a, a lot of ourfolks in CMC manufacturing, for
(40:40):
example, worked at, you know,the multinationals in China.
Because those, you actuallyneed to know best in
class western processes.
So I think we definitelyseen, seen that trend in,
in, in the next few yearsas, as these folks get more
experience, you know, they'llmove into senior management,
you know, uh, position and thenbecoming some of the C-suite.
We're already seeinga lot of that.
But I think one point, oneof the kind of highlight,
(41:01):
adjacent to this topic is, Ithink the best quote that I
heard for the last few dayscame from George Chen, from
D3 . He said, you only starta biotech if you fundamentally
want to come up and, anddevelop a drug to save humanity.
That's the only reason to do it.
So I think I wanna bringthis back and that, and all
the topic about talents.
(41:22):
I mean, we can't forgetthe entrepreneurs, right?
I mean, you think aboutMichelle, Michelle Xia, our
CEO and, and Co-Founder, right.
She, basically with her threeother Co-Founder's willed, Akeso
and Ivonescimab into existence.
I mean, look at John, right.
It's, I would say you have togive a lot of the credit to
the entrepreneurs just like inthe West, that actually will
these companies, into existence.
Jeff Cranmer (41:44):
Alright, well, we're up on time.
I, Josh is sort of.
the man who brought allthis together, Josh,
uh, parting thought.
Josh Berlin (41:51):
Yeah, I mean, first off, just wanted
to thank everyone, uh,for coming out this week,
uh, to the China summit.
You know, I thought theenergy was just infectious.
It was, it was amazing.
So, really appreciate everybodybringing the ever energy, the
partnering, the, the hallwaydiscussions, and all the great
discussions on stage as well.
And, we would very much, loveto have you guys back next
(42:13):
year when we come for our13th China Healthcare Summit.
we'll also be, in Asia again inMarch, BioCentury-BayHelix and
McKinsey with our 5th East-WestSummit, in Seoul, Korea.
So we, uh, very much hope to seeeverybody at that event as well,
'cause we think there's a lot ofopportunities, um, across Asia
that are starting to emerge now.
Jeff Cranmer (42:34):
And I'd very much like to thank, Matt
Hewitt, VP and CTO of CharlesRivers Manufacturing Business
Division, John Zu, CEOof Duality Biologics, and
Bing Wang, CFO of Akeso.
Simone, of course.
And Josh as ever.
And thank all of you forlistening in we hope that you,
(42:57):
uh, tune into our podcast.
Like it, subscribe to it, andfor our listeners around the
world, we will catch you nextMonday with a new episode of the
BioCentury This Week podcast.
[AI-generated transcript.]
Jeff Cranmer (00:02):
Welcome to a special edition of the
BioCentury This Week podcast.
Today we are coming to you fromone of the most active biotech
hubs in the world, Shanghai.
On today's podcast, we willdeliver the key takeaways from
the 12th annual BioCenturyBayHelix China Healthcare
(00:23):
Summit with our specialguests, Matt Hewitt, VP
and CTO of Charles RiversManufacturing Business Division.
We have Bing Wang, CFOof China, biotech kind of
high flying China biotechAkeso, and we have.
John Zhu of Duality Biologics.
(00:44):
He's the CEO of this companythat got the current wave of
biotech IPOs rolling on theHong Kong Stock Exchange.
late last year, I think itwas from the BioCentury side.
We have the illustriousSimone Fishburn
Simone F (01:01):
illustrious this week.
Okay.
Jeff Cranmer (01:02):
Our editor in chief, vice President.
And notorious WashingtonCommanders fan, Josh Berlin,
who's actually the man behindthe curtain of all of our
conferences, as you heard,at the beginning of today,
Simone Fishburn (01:16):
and I'm gonna, I'm gonna go, I think
he is the heart and soul ofthe China Healthcare Summit.
I, it's the heart and soul.
Heart and souls.
Josh Berlin (01:22):
Tough, tough, uh, bar there.
But I'll, I'll get, this isthe nice, they called worse.
Simone Fishburn (01:26):
This is the nicest we're
ever gonna be, Josh.
So take it, you know.
Jeff Cranmer (01:29):
All right.
Well, you may have heardthe term China speed.
Has anybody heardthat term before?
Yeah.
Simone Fishburn (01:35):
Yeah.
China speed.
Jeff Cranmer (01:36):
Well, buckle up, few of us just toward,
the Zhangjiang Science Park.
me for the first time, uh,we're top biopharmas from
around the world and aroundChina, have set up shop, and
I'm here to tell you that.
Clinical trials in Chinaare getting even faster,
if you can believe that.
(01:57):
So we'll talk the acceleratingpace of clinical development.
On today's podcast, we'llalso talk about Innovent's
$1.2 billion deal with Takedaand why the move is a giant
step toward global innovationfor the Suzhou company.
And green shoots in thefinancing market are coming
(02:20):
in the form of capital flowingagain here in China in an IPO
market, as I just mentionedin Hong Kong, that's kind of
leaving NASDAQ in the dustwhen it comes to IPOs at least.
None of this, of course, couldhappen without talent, and I'm
looking around the room hereand I see a lot of talent.
We'll discuss how China'stalent pool is rapidly evolving,
(02:44):
and we'll also talk about thedirection of biotech innovation.
Simone, let's start withaccelerating clinical trials.
Uh, what have youlearned this week?
What have you seen?
Simone Fishburn (02:57):
Right.
So, you know, for context,I wasn't on that tour
just to stipulate that.
but I heard great things aboutit, and you're gonna talk
about it in a minute, maybe.
but, you know, sitting througha really extraordinary couple of
days of panels, some take homesthat we got, well, I think it's
very well known inside Chinaand our message really is to.
(03:20):
People in the otherecosystems, the U.S.
and Europe, Really understandingwhat an impact is gonna have
globally, the way that clinicaltrial and clinical trial starts
or accelerating in China.
China is really settinga new bar for this.
we are seeing, you know,one of the most important,
perhaps underrecognizedin the west, moves.
(03:42):
That was by Esobiotec whowere in Europe trying to get
things done on very littlemoney and realizing that
the way to do that for themwas to come and run their
clinical trial in China.
And in a very shortamount of time.
And what did we talk aboutwith like four patients
or fewer even, you know,maybe even fewer than that.
(04:03):
They flipped that intoa deal with AstraZeneca.
And so, you know, my, my feelingreally is that China's setting
a new bar, we're seeing the U.K.
set itself new standards forreverting to what it used to do.
And going beyond that in termsof accelerating clinical trials.
And we all know that this reallyis the biggest bottleneck.
(04:25):
In drug development is goingfrom discovery into humans.
I mean that is, that isthe bit that takes forever
and where, you know, yourfailure rates are very high.
And so if you can reallybend the curve on how long
it takes you to get wellin speeding up, getting
that human clinical data.
You can really start tochange the paradigm and I,
(04:46):
I personally think that thatmight be where China has a
massive impact globally.
So those are mythoughts on that.
Do you wanna pickit up from there?
Bing Wang (04:53):
Sure.
Thank you Simone.
I think.
You nailed it.
I think having Jean-Pierreon the stage, um, yesterday
was a, a perfect example ofthe integration of China's
innovation in the global stage.
Here is a very scrappyentrepreneur, have much
lower resources thancompared to some of the U.S.
California and Boston Biotech.
Simone Fishburn (05:13):
C Can I just interrupt, say.
Just for the audience, thisis Jean-Pierre Latere, the
CEO of EsoBiotec, right?
Bing Wang (05:17):
Yes.
Thank you.
Yes, John Pierre Issa Biotech.
Um, so, you know, very scrappy,very talented entrepreneur.
Really made themuch smaller raise.
I think he, he did noteven break, uh, 20.
Million euros in terms of histotal raise and he was able
to get a lot accomplishedwith that capital, right?
Comparable to some of thebigger, without naming names,
(05:38):
some of the bigger U.S. in vivoCAR T companies, and able to
create enough data from bothtranslational quality of the
vectors as well as some humandata to get AstraZeneca, says,
we feel pretty de-risk aboutthis platform and actually
did very, very well for hisproduct, for his platform,
and for his investors,and I think that story.
(05:59):
Really nailed it in terms of thelast two days of how China is
part of the global system today.
Simone Fishburn (06:04):
So I actually, I wanna take it a step further
and play to my internalcrowd here and a couple of
compliments within this.
I think there are certaintimes and certain deals, quite
often events that some peopleat the time recognized their
importance going forward.
Others take longer.
You could look at the Legenddeal with J&J as a really
(06:25):
seminal deal for understandingthe value of China innovation.
I think what you've just pointedto many people may have have
whiffed on that, but that dealthat EsoBiotec did and then
getting bought, I would sayAkeso itself has certainly
made a massive splash in termsof making people understand.
Wow.
I mean, that just changedthe whole paradigm.
(06:46):
And obviously you've got a lotof followers there, Duality
doing similar things, andyou know what you've done.
Like the IPO recently is like,oh wait, wait, things are
actually happening and the,the boldness of doing that.
And so I think thatthere are more stories
coming out of China.
That we're able to lookat globally and say maybe
that was the point atwhich the trajectory took
(07:08):
a slightly different termup and up and it's the
accumulation of these things.
As said, everybody who's comingto the China conference, Josh,
you can pick it up for me in aminute, but we've been coming to
this China conference for years.
We've known it for years, butfor me it really feels like
2025 is the year that biotechglobally woke up to China.
But it's had all thesemarkers all the way along.
Josh Berlin (07:28):
Yeah, I, I totally agree with that.
Uh, Simone and we had a, atremendous number of folks
out this week in Shanghai.
lot of our western friends,both from Europe and the U.S.
who had not been out toChina, before, hadn't
been out frequently.
And I think some of it is thedeal flow that everybody's
reading about, it'salmost, um, a deal of the
(07:49):
week, kind of news flow.
And we obviously saw the, thehuge deal, uh, this week that,
um, sort of coincided with the,uh, the launch of the event,
the Innovent, uh, Takeda deal.
that news flow, Ithink has become almost
impossible to ignore.
And I think even those who mighthave, um, sort of discounted,
uh, what was happening in China.
(08:09):
You know, even a, a yearago, are now, reassessing
and trying to understand.
What's happening out here, andalso whether there might be
opportunities for them, muchlike, EsoBiotec, example, we
had quite a few European andWestern VCs out this week.
Also looking, I think, onbehalf of their portfolio
companies, they were out here.
(08:30):
Also, I think looking forpotentially NewCos and other,
ways to access innovation,but also thinking about.
How, their own portfoliocompanies in the West might
be able to, also accelerate,R&D and accelerate, proof
of concept by perhaps,um, leveraging, China.
Jeff Cranmer (08:48):
Yeah, we had the managing director of Google
Ventures out, I think it was
Simone Fishburn (08:53):
Krishna.
Jeff Cranmer (08:53):
Yeah, Krishna.
I think it was his first timeout, if I remember correct.
And we're gonna dig into the inevent deal in, in just a moment.
but I want to go over to Matt.
get U.S. back to thespeed of the trials.
And Matt, he doesn'tlive in Shanghai, but
he's here all the time.
Matt, from your perspective,what do you see?
Matthew Hewitt (09:13):
Yeah, I mean, I think for us you
know, playing in, in a lot ofthe therapeutic development
side, what we see is that.
Companies in general, regardlessof modality, are, are truly
searching for an environmentwhich colloquially we would
call it a fast test, fast fail.
So it's importantto get to clinic as
efficiently as possible.
And then once you get toclinic, it's important to get
(09:34):
that, if we wanna call it valueinflection point data, that
that tells you whether or nota a, an asset or a program
has a, a chance at success,whether it's going to late
phase or potentially goingto commercial at some point.
And over the last, fromwhat I've seen, seven, eight
years here in China, I mean,things have really matured
and that's been from multipleperspectives, whether it's
(09:57):
the IIT design, the kind ofrelaunch, uh, of the regulatory
framework and from NMPA.
and, and you know, we have alot of talent that's been coming
back to China and we, I knowwe'll talk about that soon.
But point being is, is thatthe framework here has been
streamlined such that youcan move assets through
much, uh, very efficiently.
(10:17):
And it has woken up, Ithink, other parts of the
world as well as to thatthis is now, beginning to
look like a trendsetter.
Simone Fishburn (10:25):
Can I just quickly follow up to ask you
to, um, elaborate on somethingthat we discussed earlier,
which is, you know, we talkedwhen I did a story a few
months ago about how differentregulatory agencies across
the world are looking at riskdifferently and how that is
actually changing the paceof getting into the clinic.
Can you just
Matthew Hewitt (10:45):
Yeah.
Sure.
Simone Fishb (10:45):
Elaborate on that?
Matthew Hewitt (10:46):
Yeah, so in the past we've kind of talked about
what's phase appropriate for.
companies as they're movingproducts through development
in, into, into clinical, inthe U.S. as an example, we
typically divide things intoearly and late phase clinical.
Uh, and depending on themodality, it's either phase one
or it's phase one or phase two.
And it really depends uponwhen you're going into a
(11:08):
potentially pivotal phase.
I think what we have kindof re termed that this year
is, is it's not really phaseappropriate, but it's risk
appropriate because that's howthe regulators view the world.
They don't view theworld through data.
They view theworld through risk.
And so the ideas is thatthe regulators are looking
for a path that is mostefficient, where you can,
(11:30):
uh, provide the highestquality product or therapy to
patients at the lowest risk.
I think what we've seen hereis, is that, there's been a.
a very collaborative approachto understanding what the
proper, risk is for each phaseso that we can move things very
efficiently and so we can tryto provide patients with cutting
edge therapies that they need.
Bing Wang (11:51):
I think what was very helpful last few days,
you hear from Li Chen at Hua,you heard it from funding from
McKinsey, that the governmenthere is very, very responsive
and we actually iterate with theindustry and how to make things
better from both translation.
from both an IND process,clinical, all the way to, they
even talked about a, a novelway of, of, you know, beyond
the NRDL, how to actuallyget this to patients to just
(12:13):
additional way of paying.
So I think the government hereis very, very responsive to
the needs of the industry.
Jeff Cranmer (12:18):
Hmm.
And, and thanks.
Thanks Bing I, I wannaget the names out there.
So our listeners whoaren't with us here in
the room, and, and Mattappreciated the points there.
I wanna bring John intothe conversation now.
So for those who of youwho might not be familiar
with Duality, uh, you mightbe living under a rock.
I was gonna say that, that
Simone Fishburn (12:38):
three people out there who have
been spent the last twoyears in the desert, maybe
Jeff Cranmer (12:42):
someone, uh, yeah.
Someone out there may nothave heard, but for those
of you, uh, as I mentioned,the IPO, one of the top
dealmaking China biotechs, Ithink four deals all for ADCs.
so you're in the clinic,from where you sit, what
are you seeing evolvewith clinical trials?
John Zhu (13:02):
Yeah.
First of all, we wentIPO, uh, April this
year, so Oh, was April.
April, 15th to be exact.
Wow.
And, um, I still rememberwhen we go to Hong Kong
for the road show, which isApril 7th, that's exactly
the, uh, trade war happens.
And Hong Kong Hang Seng Indexwas down like 15% in one day.
(13:23):
And, uh.
was think I were crazybecause we want to do
the, I remember everyone
Simone Fi (13:27):
going, that was bold.
Wow.
You know?
Jeff Cranmer (13:30):
Yeah.
Yeah.
So that's, so sorryI got the time wrong.
I mean, China speed is so fast.
If I may borrow a linefrom Stephen Wright,
it's like putting instantcoffee in a microwave
and going back in time.
But John, yeah, and
John Zhu (13:43):
that's, and and yes.
So we, have about six deals.
total deal sizeis 6 billion U.S.
dollar.
And that, um, from paymentand, uh, new milestones,
we collect, uh, more than5 million U.S. dollars.
So we, we did get cash wecan really can help us to
survive for, for a while.
And, uh, talk abouta clinical trial.
(14:03):
this is one of our visionfrom day one, become a
global bio pharma by globalmeaning that we really want
to, for patients global.
And, uh, we wanna builda global clinical team
and a global product.
So, not long.
We have about little bitmore than 200 employees.
(14:24):
About 30 of them are in U.S.
So by the global trial, which Imeans really MRCT from day one.
the downside is that actuallyis actually more costly to
do clinical trial in U.S.
as you, as you can tell.
but, we feel that because wewant to become a global bio
pharma, it's really, we haveto demonstrate the efficacy and
(14:46):
the safety in global patients,including U.S. patients.
And, talk about the speedup the clinical trial.
To be honest, the sentencingyou cannot do, right?
I mean, you have togive drug to patients.
They have to go throughcycle one, cycle two, right.
The sentencing, you, youjust have to respect the law.
(15:06):
Of course, you have torespect the quality.
why, why think likeChinese biotech?
We are faster if youthink about that, right?
I think the reason why we'refaster is that sometimes
we can cut the, what,what we call white space.
Just give one example, right.
we deliver the IND fromIND to first patient.
(15:28):
Some company take like threemonths or four months, and
they think it's normal.
We think it's not normal.
We take like, onemonth, you know, 45 days
first patient, right?
And, uh, from our first patientto end of Phase II meeting.
20 months and people thinkit'll take like three
years and four years longmonths, we think 20 months.
(15:49):
So we do work hard.
We can cut some waste space.
But in the end, Jeff, I thinkmost important thing is that
you need to have a clearclinical strategy that's
most important, really solve,uh, unmet medical needs.
That's number one.
And number two, youreally have to understand.
Both the U.S. practiceand the China practice,
(16:10):
and sometimes there aresynergy between each other.
In China, for example,enrollment is actually
indeed faster.
So currently we have, youknow, more than 2,700 patients
worldwide, 50% of them areactually X China, including U.S.
and Australia.
But the China patientsactually helps a lot.
(16:31):
Right.
So when design MRCT, that'sthe beauty of MRCT instead
doing China only, orU.S. on only, you are not
helping each other, right?
Just give one example.
we have a partnershipwith BioNTech for a
HER2 ADC TROP2 and ADC.
Just give one example regardingADC which is a really good
(16:51):
target expressed in multipletumors, including small
cell lung cancer, CRPC.
HCC, cervical cancer.
Our first patient is 2023,July at the time Daiichi way
ahead of us have us now weload more than 600 patient.
We're showing indications, youknow, for example, in other, in
(17:11):
like HCC cervical cancer showsignals even ahead of Daiichi.
So let's talk aboutthe, China speed.
I'll stop here.
Yeah,
Simone Fishburn (17:19):
so, so I wanna actually follow up
to, to both of you guys withsomething that you said there,
which is that you said that.
from day one you decidedto be a global biotech, and
I don't know if Akeso hasmade that same decision.
it does bring usback to the in Innovent story
and what was notable reallyin that deal mean you, you
(17:40):
might wanna talk about alittle bit also, is the, is the
fact that they retained 40%.
Rights to 40% of the, well bothcosts and, profits in the U.S.
And I am wondering whether thismold, which (BeiGene) BeOne has
really been the pioneer of, interms of starting, like being
a China-based company thatstarted with a global outlook.
(18:01):
And if you think that we'regonna have more and more
China companies that have thatglobal way of, of thinking,
can you, can you talk alittle bit about that and
whether it's what the, theimportance of the Innovent deal?
Bing Wang (18:13):
I, I think that was a very good deal for both parties.
Um, I think in particular,the fact that they're made a
deal with Takeda as opposedto being, you know, U.S.
pharma was, wasactually quite notable.
But I, I will say this,Innovent is not your
typical China biotech.
Simone Fishburn (18:26):
Mm-hmm.
Bing Wang (18:26):
Right.
There's probably.
Three or four companiesof size, right.
BeOne, Innovent ourselvesAkeso, maybe Coen, you know,
where we have the balancesheet and the capabilities
to be be to do that.
Simone Fishburn (18:39):
Mm-hmm.
Bing Wang (18:40):
I think Innovent did a very, very good job in China
commercializing their product.
But this is not truefor most biotech.
Just like in the U.S. a lotof biotech don't have the
resources, so they wouldactually take more capital
and give away more later term.
Simone Fishburn (18:52):
I'm not sure how many.
U.S. biotechs set themselvesup and say, I'm gonna
be a global biotech.
Bing Wang (18:59):
Yeah.
But I think to add to thatpoint, and I think, Simone, you
brought up a very good example.
I think the firstcompany to really do
this is actually Legend.
And the, the reason that you canget this type of leverage, and
I wanna highlight the Legend asa really good example, Carvykti
was really the first casewhere a product, a therapy that
come from China, fundamentallychanged global standard of care.
(19:22):
Right, because here wetalked about innovation.
We talk about China's speed, wetalk about efficient capital,
but end of the day, can amolecule that came out of China,
change standard of care forevery human being on earth.
That's what we hopeto do at Akeso, with
Ivonescimab, by the way.
Right?
And obviously with a biggertotal addressable market for
lung cancer, multiple myeloma.
But I think Legendreally pioneered that.
(19:42):
And I think that needsto be emphasized.
And I think, looking atthe long game, right?
can our product changestandard care for every
human being on earth?
That confidence and then theresources behind it, which
Innovent has their, their,you know, significant market
cap, significant balancesheet, significant P&L
in China to support that.
That's what allowed themto do the deal with Takeda,
(20:03):
with those structure.
Jeff Cranmer (20:04):
And that's of course Legends deal with Johnson
and Johnson, for a CAR T I sawMatt wanting to jump in there.
Matt, what are your thoughtson the Innovent deal?
Matthew Hewitt (20:13):
Uh, well I was just gonna comment more on
the, I mean, Innovent, but alsothe other comments around the
clinical trials, because we'veactually done some work around
this on looking at, how biotechsspecifically in the U.S. set
up, you know, clinical programsand what's important to them.
it's single, usuallysingle center, maybe two
or three center clinicaltrials within one geo.
(20:34):
And in fact, we've askedthe question of various
biotechs in the U.S. are youthinking about other geos?
And the answer is always no,because they're not thinking
about it until they get throughalmost a BLA filing before they
start thinking about other geos.
So I think that is somewhatunique that something we see
here in China, to John's pointthat, you know, where you're
(20:56):
gonna see, um, these China,China biotechs really take on
some multiple geos at the sametime, even simultaneously, even
if we're talking about Chinain Australia, where, you know,
with TGA it's quite acceptingof, of new, uh, trials.
There's, there's varioustax credits that are there.
you've got well-defined patientpopulations with a lot of the
population being sequenced,even in different, even in
(21:18):
different states in Australia.
But then of course, then you'realways looking at the U.S.
because generally, even if it's,it's not really reciprocity,
but there will be one way.
recognition of like a U.S.
IND by China, by Australia,that minimizes your need to
do additional activities toset up clinical activities.
Josh Berlin (21:37):
Yeah, man, I, I wanted to ask you something.
So, you know, I took a fewmeetings, uh, this week when
I wasn't on, uh, stage ordoing things in this room and.
with a few China biotechs.
I won't, name and are um,much earlier stage than, uh,
than John or Bing's company.
But, um, you know, sat througha couple of presentations with
them and one thing that wasstruck me, was, that several
(21:59):
companies, rather than sayingsort of proof of concept,
which I hear, you know, youhear so much in the U.S.
where instead sayingproof of signal.
That, that that's whatthey were trying to get.
They were trying to get to proofof signal so that they could,
essentially use early data toattract, potential partners.
So I, I don't know ifyou, you know, what, what
you think about that.
Matthew Hewitt (22:17):
Yeah, I mean we, we do have that structure,
I would say within the U.S.
and Europe, but we classicallycall it like phase zeros or kind
of looking glass trials where,we'll, similar to EsoBiotec
did here, you know, with those2, 3, 4 patients and then
look for some efficacy signal.
depends on the modality,because many times you're
doing lead-in doses.
(22:38):
And, I think to John's point,I mean, I think the, the white
space that's optimized here thatenables you to do that is, is
one, kind of time to set up.
So, you know, within theU.S. and Europe, it can take
a year to activate a singleclinical site, whereas here.
It's, it's far, far shorter,let's just put it that way.
And then I think, you know,some of the other things that we
(23:00):
see on the clinical side aroundspacing out dosing required,
wait periods between dosingbetween patients, you know,
as much more minimized hereon our risk adjusted basis.
So, you know, we can speedthings up and get to that
signal much more quickly.
Jeff Cranmer (23:15):
Alright, we're uh, gonna go to a break shortly.
and then we'll come backand we'll talk about the.
talent, we're gonna talk aboutthe direction of innovation,
and we're gonna talk aboutthe financial markets.
so we'll take a quick breakand we'll be right back.
Alanna Farro (23:32):
BioCentury This Week is brought to you by
The 5th East-West BiopharmaSummit in South Korea.
An arc of innovation isemerging across Asia, and
Western biopharma leadersare taking note-from
cross-border deals to newcos.
In March, 2026, The 5thBioCentury-BayHelix East-West
BioPharma Summit visits SouthKorea for the first time.
(23:55):
Meet the biopharma leadersputting Korea innovation
on the global map.
Learn why Korea hasbecome a clinical trial
in manufacturing hub.
Discover if Korea is the nexthotspot for NewCo formation.
Plus, meet biopharmainnovators from India to
Singapore, to China and Japan.
Register now atBioCenturyEastWest.com.
Jeff Cranmer (24:19):
And we're back.
Simone, are, we've heard froma lot of our Indian colleagues
that they were a little pissedoff at Josh that he made
this meeting during Diwali.
Last year, Josh kind of gotme a little miffed 'cause he
made the meeting at Halloween.
Yeah.
But you know, if you move ita little earlier, not only
(24:40):
do you get to skip ESMO,which I'm sure everyone would
love, but it could be during.
Simone Fishburn (24:46):
So I, I wanna jump in here, Jeff.
And um, I think we haveto break it to Josh.
I've been.
Hinting to him for two daysthat there is this ground swell.
There is this like huge numberof people at this conference
who want this conferenceset during the Shanghai
Tennis Open next year, Josh.
So, you know, I'mgoing public with this.
(25:08):
And the, the pressure's on
Josh Berlin (25:10):
we're, we're working on it.
Simone Fishburn (25:12):
Most notably.
I think that was a yes, right?
I think I heard a yes.
Then
Jeff Cranmer (25:16):
most notably a young man named Alcaraz who has
an intense interest in biotech.
I understand.
You might wanna becomea stakeholder in a
Akeso or perhaps Duality
Simone Fishburn (25:26):
keynote speaker more likely.
Josh Berlin (25:27):
He could be a family office.
Maybe a family office play.
Jeff Cranmer (25:29):
And Simone, I also noticed you, you
had some interestinglooking socks on today.
You wanna tell us about
Simone Fishburn (25:34):
we're going this, I think,
I think you should.
I think you should startwith, Josh and Matt's socks.
Jeff Cranmer (25:39):
Oh my goodness.
Look at these things.
BioCentury's this week.
Podcast socks.
Josh Berlin (25:45):
Yes.
We need to give full creditto, uh, Brian Denker, who
was mentioned earlier forsourcing, a whole bunch
of, BioCentury's This Week,socks, this week, in Shanghai.
So if any, uh, of the listenerswanna a pair of socks, he should
try to track down Jeff or.
Simone at the next event.
Simone Fishburn (26:02):
You gotta come to a, you gotta come to a
live podcast to get the socks.
There's no, I, I wannato tell you something.
I was shamed at the lastconference when I had to go
with toenail color 'causeI didn't have the socks.
So I went out and boughtsome 'cause I was on
London on the way.
Some nice London socks here.
Josh Berlin (26:17):
Those are good..
Jeff Cranmer (26:17):
Well I'm, I'm paying respect to China here.
I got some dragon socks.
Oh.
Because, uh, yo that'swhat it's about.
Simone Fishburn (26:24):
They're a bit low res though.
They need to be more,
Jeff Cranmer (26:26):
They're low rise.
It's, uh, it's true.
I didn't have a lot of timebefore I got on the plane.
So you may have seen thatsign on some people's desks
that say, I'm silentlyjudging your grammar.
Has anyone seen that sign?
Maybe it's justan editor's thing.
Here at BioCentury's, whenyou're on a panel, we're
silently judging yoursocks and for being a good
(26:49):
sport and coming out today.
John, you've just won a pairof BioCentury This Week socks.
All right.
Alright, well let's turn tothe financial markets and hey,
we have a CFO on our panel.
So Bing, I'm gonna go to you.
what were you hearing this week?
Bing Wang (27:07):
I think, um, across different stages of capital.
I think earlier stage peopletalk about, NewCo formation
and, and, and how theythink about that, right?
I think, we have.
some experienced Chinese VCslike James Wang talk about it.
You know, it's anothersource of, funding assets.
But then we also had apanel that had some bankers
and, folks that are morelater stage in the capital.
(27:29):
you know, I think Bin Li atLake Bleu also talked about
this, that, you know, peopleare basically asking what is the
state of the Hong Kong market?
You know, I think a lotof people are saying
potentially there may be.
A correction, but itwouldn't be a bad thing.
I think people are stilloptimistic long term, but
maybe some near term volatilityis, is what we're hearing.
But definitely a lot offolks have seen that.
(27:50):
Um, biotech is, isum, is innovating.
I think end of the day this isno different than NASDAQ where
you know, you have to showthe data and so far I think,
um, the China biotechs have,have delivered on the data.
Simone Fishburn (28:02):
So
Jeff Cranmer (28:02):
We've seen, far more IPOs.
I forget the exact number,but far more IPOs have gotten
out on the Hong Kong exchange
Bing Wang (28:09):
Mm-hmm.
Jeff Cranmer (28:09):
than Nasdaq this year.
Bing Wang (28:10):
Yes.
Jeff Cranmer (28:11):
the key indexes in Hong Kong are way up.
Bing Wang (28:14):
Mm-hmm.
Jeff Cranmer (28:15):
John, uh, why was April the right time
for you guys to go out?
I don't, until you got out, Ithink it had been pretty quiet
John Zhu (28:22):
We're the first one.
Jeff Cranmer (28:23):
Yeah,
Josh Berlin (28:23):
you sort of caught the beginning of the wave there.
Yeah.
Simone Fishburn (28:25):
Well maybe they, I mean, caught the
beginning of the wave.
They created the wave.
Josh Berlin (28:29):
caused the wave.
Yeah.
John Zhu (28:30):
I think because we are crazy, so, so we
actually have a, um, longshow with investors in March.
It's actually, they'repretty about our asset.
Because we, we have assessthat have, global potential.
For example, our B73, wehave the opting we can
co-develop with BioNTech.
(28:52):
This is similar to like,uh, J&J's 19 Legend deal
co-development, and so manyU.S. long term investors.
They are very interestedin this story.
So I feel like, hmm,we might have a chance.
And then according toplan, so we we're going
to launch IPO April andthen hit the trade war.
So, but at that time, to behonest, we have not a choice.
(29:15):
We can back off, right.
And choose anotherpoint, but who knows
what's going to happen.
So we just, so sinceI'm crazy, I just go
out and do the IPO, so.
Simone Fishburn (29:25):
I wanna go back to your point.
I heard sort of acouple of themes.
Now you, what did, whatwas the word you, you used
the word correction, right?
And I think the wordsranged from bubble, it's
a bubble that will burst.
Bing Wang (29:39):
Try hard not to say that word.
Yes, you, you
Simone Fishburn (29:41):
tried, but other people said it.
Right.
And then there was frothy andthen there was correction.
And generally a feeling thatvaluations might be too high.
But still, I would say netnet, a positive kind of
sentiment that that things will.
Maintain in a, in a gooddirection is, is that, you
know, one was like, yes,we're outta the tunnel.
(30:03):
Like, is the light atthe end of the tunnel?
We're outta thetunnel kind of thing.
Bing Wang (30:07):
Yeah.
I think if, if I could commenton that maybe more broadly.
I think what we discovered thatinvestors all around the world.
Have no problem investingin the Hong Kong market.
It's a very robust market.
It's a very developed market.
You know, I think after NewYork, maybe after London,
you know, Hong Kong's a verydeveloped market that gives
people a lot of confidence inthe quality of the investors,
(30:30):
the quality of the regulatoryrequirement to be listed.
And then, you know, the qualityof the company's here, you
know, so, at Akeso we did a$250 million raise last October.
In August we did a$450 million raise.
Most of the investorsare overseas, right?
We have a lot of investorsthat came in from Europe.
We have some quitea bit from the U.S.
and obviously Singapore and,and other areas, but it's a very
(30:53):
international set of investorsthat came into our cap table.
So I think with that in mind,and obviously, you know,
we're of a, of a differentsize and many of the other
companies that recently listed,but I think good quality
companies can list in HongKong and don't feel like.
It's somehow a handicapped just'cause you're not on nasdaq.
So that is kind of the thingthat I would say I want to
(31:14):
emphasize is that the Hong Kongmarket is, is, is quite robust.
It's gonna have your up anddowns like any other market,
but we're attracting veryinternational European and
North American investorsin, into our cap table.
Josh Berlin (31:24):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Bing, I mean I, you know, Ithink for our U.S. listeners,
um, you know, the idea that it'sin a, a bubble or that there's
a, irrational exuberance.
It might be a, um.
A bit of a shock to folksthat haven't been following
the story this year.
But, you know, I had a fewdiscussions, uh, this week,
where, um, a discussion withone of the top, lawyers, uh,
(31:45):
in Hong Kong, as well as oneof the top bankers who both
told me independently thatthey were turning away work.
That they, they literallycouldn't handle the workload and
were turning away good clientsthat they would've normally
taken 'cause they were afraidthey couldn't deliver the work.
thought that was an interesting,take when, when the bankers are
turning awake, too much work,I won't use the word bubble,
(32:06):
but maybe there's somethinggoing, something going on.
Um, but there's alsoa, a long queue, right?
'cause you need to get approvedto go IPO in, in Hong Kong.
And there's, there's apretty long queue right now.
The wait was like,
Simone Fishburn (32:16):
what is it, six months or, I mean,
it's, it's a long wait.
Josh Berlin (32:18):
Yeah.
Simone Fishburn (32:19):
Yeah.
Six to eight months.
Can, can I pick up on somethingelse that you talked about?
Um, You talked about peoplerewarding innovation and
investors understanding that,tying that together because
that's sort of what I wanted to,pick up on as well in terms of
the thread, tying that together.
Let's go all the way back towhat you said about Legend,
setting a new standard.
You yourselves did that atAkeso with the Summit data
(32:42):
where you told the world, wait,we can actually be better.
Bing Wang (32:45):
I'm sorry.
Our data,
Simone Fishburn (32:47):
your data,
Bing Wang (32:47):
Our Akeso data.
Just be clear.
The, sorry.
Absolutely right.
The, the Akeso data rightin within the partnership,
but the Akeso data, um, thatgrabbed the attention of the
world because it could bebetter than Keytruda alone.
And so that was, I think formany people a turning point.
Meaning turning their heads tolook at, wait a minute, this
(33:09):
isn't just a fast followerstory and what we are now
starting to see is more whatwe call first order innovation.
So one of the themes that Iwanted to raise, Jeff, China
is known so well for, andwe heard this throughout the
last two days, its incredibleability to do anything
with an antibody fast andwhatever you want, right?
(33:30):
Can make it an ADC,a bispecific ADC.
You can make it a bispecific,you know, various things.
But one of the questionsthat came up is, is
it gonna start now?
Is the next wave gonna be siRNA?
So we heard that in severaldifferent threads and I
thought that was interesting.
Jeff Cranmer (33:43):
Yeah.
Well, um, I guess wealso heard a lot about,
Gene and cell therapy.
Uh, what was thenumber of programs?
Simone Fishburn (33:49):
Well, there was what the number that I
think you're thinking aboutis, I think Nisa said there
are 130 in vivo CAR T programs.
Jeff Cranme (33:57):
Yeah, that's right.
thought that siRNA wouldbe Comparable to that.
Quickly.
Uh, Matt, from where you sit,where do you see the direction
of innovation going, in China?
Matthew Hewitt (34:09):
Yeah, I mean, I, coming back to the cell and
gene therapy numbers, I mean,we, we track those via several
consortia that we're a part of.
And generally still, I wouldsay that the U.S. is first
still in assets and trials.
I, China has been very, veryquickly catching up though,
and is definitely nippingat the heels of, of the U.S.
and certainly I think we'reseeing that speed up now.
(34:31):
and then we're seeing alot of the kind of seminal
platforms and nucleic acidsaround siRNA, but other nucleic
acid platforms in general.
and they're coming upto the point where there
can be some additionalinnovation done to them.
I think it's, uh, youknow, given the experience,
and the track record thatChina and the innovators
here have in antibodies.
(34:52):
It is, you know, a ripearea for further innovation
and optimization.
we've got some really good,uh, de-risking in terms of
clinical assets that have gone,gone on to become commercial
and then in, in multiple geos.
You know, they'veworked out pretty well.
The, uh, um, I, we didn'ttouch on this earlier, but
another thing that it canbe a difficulty is getting
(35:12):
clinicians comfortable witha new modality and, and then
giving it to patients orprescribing it for patients.
I know within advancedtherapies we always talk
about vein to vein time.
But the actual term that westarted using lately is brain
to vein, because that's whenthe clinicians will actually
start prescribing them to thepatients in large numbers,
which is ultimately what theterms, uh, commercial success.
(35:33):
So I think that coupledwith, you know, kind of the
familiarity of regulatorsand reimbursement strategies
is gonna be, you know,present a pretty nice,
uh, opportunity there.
Jeff Cranmer (35:43):
we're, kind of coming up on time and I, we,
I do want to get to talent,but John, I really do wanna
get your take as sort of beingat the forefront of ADCs.
what are you excited about?
What are you kind ofhearing about bubbling up?
Just, just real quick.
John Zhu (35:57):
Real quick.
Actually, one year ago I said,uh, something that's actually,
at that time it's very radical.
In BioCentury forum, Isaid watch out, Chinese
biotech is coming.
Because biotech is biologyplus technology and the Chinese
biotech, you know, we'revery strong in engineering.
This year, I'm gonna sayslightly different point.
(36:19):
I think the boundarybetween biology, we'll
talk about target, right?
And the technology, when we talkabout the ADCs linker payload,
it's actually become blurredbecause if you have a strong
technology, so you can reallyhelp you validate your biology.
Actually you can speedup, speed up your science
and therefore have a trueinnovation like a PD-1, or VEGF.
(36:40):
I'm not sure that'sbiology or engineering.
We talk about bispecificsbut the the boundaries broad.
In summary, I think thetrue innovation will come
out from Chinese biotech.
Simone Fishb (36:50):
I agree with that.
Jeff Cranmer (36:52):
Alright, well, talent is shifting.
That's one thing Ilearned this week.
Back in the day, the leadersof China, biotech companies,
10 years ago, they werereturnees the so-called sea
turtles who they went toget their PhD in the U.S.
They worked at Novartis,J&J, you name it.
(37:13):
They came back, they foundedcompanies and I was talking
to Vince Deng this week,who was at Med-Fine Capital.
And, and he started anew fund a few years ago.
And he said for him, he waslike, Hey, I'm gonna look
at the person who was numbertwo, number three, number
four, working for one ofthese returnees and w ork with
(37:35):
them to set up a new company.
And so that, that wasinteresting to me.
I, what, what have youbeen hearing, Simone?
Simone Fishburn (37:40):
Yeah, I mean, thi this came up, I had a
conversation with Kevin Li.
It also came up on, on thepanel, the scene setter panel.
And so definitely thisgeneration, I'm gonna call
it our generation, youknow, in China, those,
those folks, it, it wasstandard to go to the U.S.
get your training, get yourcredibility, and come, and
you, you know, those peoplethen came back to China
(38:01):
and that's been the mantra.
In fact, that's beenthe mantra globally.
It was the mantra in theU.K. and, and Europe as well.
And what I'm hearingis that this emerging
generation in China.
Of, you know, maybe the nextleaders, they don't feel that
they have to go to the U.S.
in order to get the training.
And I think, Matt, you made thepoint earlier when we talked
(38:22):
that they may still get thetraining of how things are done.
Now in China by working fromMNCs inside China and or as
you point Jeff, working forpeople who've done that.
The point that I was making wasthat that generation doesn't
feel the need to go to the U.S.
They'll be more domesticallygenerated, you know, talent and
(38:45):
the analogy was like, there wasGenentech, and then Genentech
spawned a whole number of,uh, you know, other companies.
Matt looks like youwanna respond to that.
Matthew Hewitt (38:53):
That.
I mean, I, I, I'll probablylike reiterate what I said this
morning, which was that, I mean,to your story, Jeff, I mean, how
did that fund find those people?
They went to the people thattrained in the U.S. I mean,
that's the starting point,
Jeff Cranmer (39:05):
Right.
Matthew Hewitt (39:05):
and it's not to say that.
I mean, it's gonna evolvefrom that point, but the
starting point remains thatthe only way they're finding
those people is by finding thepeople that went and trained
in the U.S. and came back.
So if we start from thatanchor, if you will.
Then certainly you can iterateupon that and then, you know,
there's gonna be subsequent,generations so to speak
(39:26):
of talent that are, don'tneed to then go to the U.S.
but have the pedigree oftraining under our folks.
And I think coming to backto John's point around,
taking more global outlookas a Chinese biotech.
I mean, to me that happensfrom this first generation of
talent that trained in the U.S.
came back, has the experienceof global, commercialization
versus local commercialization.
(39:48):
And if you look at a lot ofthe U.S. biotechs, like I said
before, I mean, I'll say thereason why a lot of those U.S.
biotechs focus on U.S. only,is it because a lot of times
those folks only know how tocommercialize in the U.S. They
don't necessarily know howto commercialize in China.
They don't know how tocommercialize in Japan.
Korea anywhere here in APAC.
So, I mean, I think it givesU.S. a kind of a, a really
good, uh, legitimacy to theChinese biotech scene that
(40:11):
they've got a more globaloutlook on the talent.
Simone Fishburn (40:14):
Can we get your thoughts on this as well?
You know, running a company?
Yeah.
And what are you seeing?
Bing Wang (40:18):
Well, we definitely see a mix, right?
So at Akeso, a lot of the, thesenior management have, you
know, overseas experience, youknow, myself included, but.
I would say the next layer down,right, the VPs and the directors
are, are all mostly domestic,talent and trained some of
them at other China biotechs,some of them at multinationals.
Um, I think, uh, a, a lot of ourfolks in CMC manufacturing, for
(40:40):
example, worked at, you know,the multinationals in China.
Because those, you actuallyneed to know best in
class western processes.
So I think we definitelyseen, seen that trend in,
in, in the next few yearsas, as these folks get more
experience, you know, they'llmove into senior management,
you know, uh, position and thenbecoming some of the C-suite.
We're already seeinga lot of that.
But I think one point, oneof the kind of highlight,
(41:01):
adjacent to this topic is, Ithink the best quote that I
heard for the last few dayscame from George Chen, from
D3 . He said, you only starta biotech if you fundamentally
want to come up and, anddevelop a drug to save humanity.
That's the only reason to do it.
So I think I wanna bringthis back and that, and all
the topic about talents.
(41:22):
I mean, we can't forgetthe entrepreneurs, right?
I mean, you think aboutMichelle, Michelle Xia, our
CEO and, and Co-Founder, right.
She, basically with her threeother Co-Founder's willed, Akeso
and Ivonescimab into existence.
I mean, look at John, right.
It's, I would say you have togive a lot of the credit to
the entrepreneurs just like inthe West, that actually will
these companies, into existence.
Jeff Cranmer (41:44):
Alright, well, we're up on time.
I, Josh is sort of.
the man who brought allthis together, Josh,
uh, parting thought.
Josh Berlin (41:51):
Yeah, I mean, first off, just wanted
to thank everyone, uh,for coming out this week,
uh, to the China summit.
You know, I thought theenergy was just infectious.
It was, it was amazing.
So, really appreciate everybodybringing the ever energy, the
partnering, the, the hallwaydiscussions, and all the great
discussions on stage as well.
And, we would very much, loveto have you guys back next
(42:13):
year when we come for our13th China Healthcare Summit.
we'll also be, in Asia again inMarch, BioCentury-BayHelix and
McKinsey with our 5th East-WestSummit, in Seoul, Korea.
So we, uh, very much hope to seeeverybody at that event as well,
'cause we think there's a lot ofopportunities, um, across Asia
that are starting to emerge now.
Jeff Cranmer (42:34):
And I'd very much like to thank, Matt
Hewitt, VP and CTO of CharlesRivers Manufacturing Business
Division, John Zu, CEOof Duality Biologics, and
Bing Wang, CFO of Akeso.
Simone, of course.
And Josh as ever.
And thank all of you forlistening in we hope that you,
(42:57):
uh, tune into our podcast.
Like it, subscribe to it, andfor our listeners around the
world, we will catch you nextMonday with a new episode of the
BioCentury This Week podcast.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Burden
The Burden is a documentary series that takes listeners into the hidden places where justice is done (and undone). It dives deep into the lives of heroes and villains. And it focuses a spotlight on those who triumph even when the odds are against them. Season 5 - The Burden: Death & Deceit in Alliance On April Fools Day 1999, 26-year-old Yvonne Layne was found murdered in her Alliance, Ohio home. David Thorne, her ex-boyfriend and father of one of her children, was instantly a suspect. Another young man admitted to the murder, and David breathed a sigh of relief, until the confessed murderer fingered David; “He paid me to do it.” David was sentenced to life without parole. Two decades later, Pulitzer winner and podcast host, Maggie Freleng (Bone Valley Season 3: Graves County, Wrongful Conviction, Suave) launched a “live” investigation into David's conviction alongside Jason Baldwin (himself wrongfully convicted as a member of the West Memphis Three). Maggie had come to believe that the entire investigation of David was botched by the tiny local police department, or worse, covered up the real killer. Was Maggie correct? Was David’s claim of innocence credible? In Death and Deceit in Alliance, Maggie recounts the case that launched her career, and ultimately, “broke” her.” The results will shock the listener and reduce Maggie to tears and self-doubt. This is not your typical wrongful conviction story. In fact, it turns the genre on its head. It asks the question: What if our champions are foolish? Season 4 - The Burden: Get the Money and Run “Trying to murder my father, this was the thing that put me on the path.” That’s Joe Loya and that path was bank robbery. Bank, bank, bank, bank, bank. In season 4 of The Burden: Get the Money and Run, we hear from Joe who was once the most prolific bank robber in Southern California, and beyond. He used disguises, body doubles, proxies. He leaped over counters, grabbed the money and ran. Even as the FBI was closing in. It was a showdown between a daring bank robber, and a patient FBI agent. Joe was no ordinary bank robber. He was bright, articulate, charismatic, and driven by a dark rage that he summoned up at will. In seven episodes, Joe tells all: the what, the how… and the why. Including why he tried to murder his father. Season 3 - The Burden: Avenger Miriam Lewin is one of Argentina’s leading journalists today. At 19 years old, she was kidnapped off the streets of Buenos Aires for her political activism and thrown into a concentration camp. Thousands of her fellow inmates were executed, tossed alive from a cargo plane into the ocean. Miriam, along with a handful of others, will survive the camp. Then as a journalist, she will wage a decades long campaign to bring her tormentors to justice. Avenger is about one woman’s triumphant battle against unbelievable odds to survive torture, claim justice for the crimes done against her and others like her, and change the future of her country. Season 2 - The Burden: Empire on Blood Empire on Blood is set in the Bronx, NY, in the early 90s, when two young drug dealers ruled an intersection known as “The Corner on Blood.” The boss, Calvin Buari, lived large. He and a protege swore they would build an empire on blood. Then the relationship frayed and the protege accused Calvin of a double homicide which he claimed he didn’t do. But did he? Award-winning journalist Steve Fishman spent seven years to answer that question. This is the story of one man’s last chance to overturn his life sentence. He may prevail, but someone’s gotta pay. The Burden: Empire on Blood is the director’s cut of the true crime classic which reached #1 on the charts when it was first released half a dozen years ago. Season 1 - The Burden In the 1990s, Detective Louis N. Scarcella was legendary. In a city overrun by violent crime, he cracked the toughest cases and put away the worst criminals. “The Hulk” was his nickname. Then the story changed. Scarcella ran into a group of convicted murderers who all say they are innocent. They turned themselves into jailhouse-lawyers and in prison founded a lway firm. When they realized Scarcella helped put many of them away, they set their sights on taking him down. And with the help of a NY Times reporter they have a chance. For years, Scarcella insisted he did nothing wrong. But that’s all he’d say. Until we tracked Scarcella to a sauna in a Russian bathhouse, where he started to talk..and talk and talk. “The guilty have gone free,” he whispered. And then agreed to take us into the belly of the beast. Welcome to The Burden.