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Yang Simiao's current situation is a bit "awkward"
.
Affected by the tide of domestic innovation, he left a multinational pharmaceutical company to work for many years two years ago and was invited to join the R&D center of a local pharmaceutical company in the United States, mainly working with American universities and MNC to find innovative drug projects
.
However, since the beginning of this year, his R&D center has been downsizing, and the previous team of hundreds of people has only left a few staff members
who track BD.
He has also recently considered whether to return to MNC or return to China
.
This is not an isolated case, according to another Chinese who is engaged in research and development overseas, a company that started with generic drugs combined with generic drugs and then invested heavily in innovative drugs also decided to transfer its cutting-edge research in American companies to China at the end of 2021, retaining only some employees
of the BD discovery team in the United States.
Several pharmacists working in the United States interviewed by E drug managers observed that since 2022, many local pharmaceutical companies that have been recruiting talents overseas have also contracted and laid off employees
.
In order to undertake and release the drug price pressure brought about by the domestic centralized procurement policy and the national medical insurance negotiation, and to seek more increments, traditional pharmaceutical companies in transition or innovative pharmaceutical companies pursuing FIC have paid attention to international layout and invested heavily in recent years
.
But at the same time, a number of domestic innovative drugs have suffered more setbacks than achievements
on the road to "going to sea".
After wave of practice, the industry has begun to realize whether pharmaceutical companies have accumulated funds, provoked tens of millions of dollars in international multi-center clinical research expenses for foreign clinics, whether they have localized teams, understand the rules of the game in various countries, and whether they have a differentiated product foundation that can meet uncovered clinical needs and have promotion value.
At the same time, it is more aware that the internationalization of innovative drugs is not so much a competition for R&D investment, regulatory rules, and localized talents, but rather a "touchstone"
for product competitiveness.
Knock on the FDA door
Knock on the FDA door The difference in supervision is undoubtedly a major "roadblock"
for China's innovative drugs to go global.
Previously, when BeiGene and Legend Biologics' products were approved by the FDA and frequently successfully "went overseas", many people "smelled" the FDA's "tolerance" for Chinese innovative drugs
.
For a time, the relatively lucrative US market has become a hot land
for innovative drugs to "go to sea".
However, some analysts pointed out that since the end of last year, the FDA seems to have reversed the wind, causing many companies to withdraw their product applications
.
However, there are also different views that there is no such thing as a "change in the direction of the wind," and the failure to "break through" did not begin
last year.
"Chinese innovative drugs pay a lot of tuition fees on the way to sea, but I always feel that the lessons learned are still not enough
.
"
An industry insider who works in a U.
S.
pharmaceutical company and has been paying attention to the Chinese market for a long time pointed out, "In my opinion, there are two extremes
at present.
First, some people think that the FDA is too 'tolerant', such as taking a clinical study of a conditionally approved product to submit, which is easy to be rejected; second, some people think the FDA is too 'mysterious', worried about cultural differences, Sino-US games and a series of external factors, which play a great negative role in it, and are afraid
of it.
In fact, it is not so complicated at all, the FDA is to look at the data and products, as long as the data is good and true, and the product advantages are obvious, there must be opportunities
.
”
In terms of specific operations, how to knock on the FDA door? The first step, of course, is to fully understand the policy
.
In a previous interview, Liu Que, CMO of Yachuang, pointed out to E drug managers that the understanding of the FDA's regulatory philosophy and rules may be the first barrier
for local pharmaceutical companies to open up the US market.
In his opinion, the FDA's information disclosure is very transparent, in addition to information access, the heads of various FDA departments will have regular lectures, which is very valuable
for Chinese companies.
Other than that, the best way is to engage
with them.
FDA is a service-oriented department, and if a company wants to prepare for an IND, the company can make an appointment with the FDA for a pre-IND meeting
.
"In this link, the most important thing is to communicate early and listen to their opinions, especially in clinical design and implementation, to consider what kind of data to produce, what kind of patients to enroll, from which regions to call patients, etc.
, these issues need to communicate with regulatory agencies to start registration for clinical trials, so the success rate will be higher
.
" The head of BD of an innovative pharmaceutical company pointed out
.
Some Chinese in the pharmaceutical industry working in the United States suggest to domestic pharmaceutical companies that it is best to recruit some local experienced employees as "guides"
.
"The priorities of many things are not intuitively expressed on documents
.
" She believes that finding a good "guide" can save a lot of exploration
, trial and error, and paying tuition.
In terms of channels, you can contact through relatively large headhunting companies, through some local medical circles, etc.
, or simply through some personal relationships
.
But there is one thing to note, that is, the company's management philosophy, management model, and respect
for employees.
Only a good company can really attract excellent people to join
.
Pharmaceutical companies "go abroad" to build teams, which are generally divided into three categories, recruiting locals, recruiting local Chinese, and sending company executives to expand the market
.
Except for the third category, which does not have cultural identity, the remaining two types of retention under cultural identity after recruitment have always been a challenge
that Chinese pharmaceutical companies need to overcome when building overseas teams.
Ideally, "double-faced" talents who are familiar with the local market and have rich practical experience in overseas markets are important
.
These are more clear about clinical practice, domestic and foreign regulations, etc.
, which is more conducive to pharmaceutical companies to do better globalization, and teams can establish full "interaction"
.
"If Chinese pharmaceutical companies want to successfully go overseas to the United States, from the beginning, they must make clearer plans
in terms of strategic settings based on their own development strategies, investment stages and strength scale.
"
The above-mentioned Chinese in the pharmaceutical industry who started a business in the United States believe that "entering the local market requires extreme localization, and local managers with all-round careers and experience are also needed to operate, but it is difficult for companies to find and retain suitable long-term talents
.
" Chinese enterprises going abroad, after formulating a clear strategy, must match the corresponding funds and talents, complete the construction of the talent echelon, and finally focus on overcoming difficulties, but this is not an easy task
.
”
In the end, it is product competitiveness
In the end, it is product competitiveness "Many Chinese pharmaceutical companies have set up companies in the United States before, but most of them have not been very successful, and many have now withdrawn
.
Others have not been completely withdrawn, but have reduced the scale of operations, such as retaining only product approval, or product investment segments, which only retain the function
of project introduction.
”
A Chinese scientist who has worked in the field of medicine in the United States said
this to the manager of E Medicine.
Since China's accession to the ICH, with the continuous reform in the field of drug review and approval, China's development of overseas clinical trials has accelerated
.
In order to improve clinical quality, reduce costs and increase efficiency, for pharmaceutical companies that want to internationalize, choosing to carry out multi-center clinical trials around the world can be described as a necessary choice for their customs clearance, and it is also a barrier
.
Carrying out international multi-center clinical trials, which often cost tens of millions of dollars, is still a challenge
that every pharmaceutical company has to face.
Guoyuan Securities has provided such a data, in the United States, the total cost of a patient to participate in a clinical trial is about 50,000 to 100,000 US dollars, but in China it is only 30,000 to 50,000 yuan
.
Taking BeiGene as a reference, BeiGene started earlier and is currently going far
on the internationalization journey of Chinese pharmaceutical companies.
In the first half of 2022, BeiGene invested a total of US$768 million (approximately RMB5.
53 billion) in R&D expenses in the first half of the year, a year-on-year increase of 13.
49%, according to its semi-annual report, its R&D investment was mainly used for pre-bed research, clinical trials, and collaborative R&D of its product pipeline.
In 2021, its R&D expenditure of up to 9.
538 billion yuan was mainly derived from the development of international clinical trials, and according to its annual report, BeiGene enrolled more than 14,500 clinical participants worldwide, about half of whom were from overseas
.
Hengrui Pharmaceutical, the transformation of domestic traditional pharmaceutical companies, ranked second to
BeiGene with a R&D investment of 6.
203 billion yuan in the same year.
In 2021, Hengrui Pharmaceutical's overseas R&D investment reached 1.
236 billion yuan, accounting for 19.
93% of the total R&D investment, and carried out 20 international clinical trials, including 7 international multi-center clinical trials
.
In addition, more tricky than research and development expenses is product innovation, "a very real problem is that if the product innovation competitiveness is not enough, it may be difficult to recruit patients
when doing clinical work overseas, especially in developed countries.
" After all, for local patients, there may already be many better products on the market worth choosing
.
So if you want to go to sea, there is another point to practice internal skills
first.
”
Yang Simiao said
to the manager of E medicine.
The understanding of FDA regulatory rules, the identification and retention of talent, and the high investment in research and development are all critical, but in the end, these are all external factors
.
"For 'going to sea', approval is never the ultimate goal, market competitiveness, and being able to obtain market benefits is the core
.
"
Yang Simiao said, "Insurance companies in the United States will also assess that if the patient's hospital stay is reduced and the overall medical cost is reduced, then I will pay more for this drug
.
" "This requires that in the trial design, the drug can fully reflect the product advantages and differentiated competitiveness
.
" For the US market, it is not necessary for FIC products to be approved and obtain benefits, and many other products, as long as the test design is good and the data performance is good, can also obtain good results
.
”
(At the request of the interviewer, Yang Simiao is a pseudonym in the article)