The transformation of the pharmaceutical industry accelerates the multi-point flowering of innovative drug research and development

The first impression investors gave investors of the 2009 listing was that the business was sound, and that there had not been a year of declining performance in the nine years since the listing. In 2017, the company's revenue and net profit were four times and 5.6 times, respectively, nine years ago (2008).
the past year, the company has received CFDA approvals for several innovative drug projects in a row, as well as several breakthroughs in the development of innovative drug projects, an achievement that has impressed the market. More recently, the company has also established a partnership with Zhong Nanshan academicians in clinical trials of new drugs to accelerate the drug's market. Why is the company transitioning to innovative pharmaceuticals? What is the company's research and development direction in innovative drugs? On August 22nd, Long Chaofeng, executive vice president of Zhongsheng Pharmaceuticals, gave a micro-interview to the Securities Times e company, telling investors about the company's transformation and future strategic planning.the transformation of
the pharmaceutical industry was founded in 1979, the original direction of business to Chinese medicine-based. Today, the company has 60 or 70 Chinese medicine approval, more than ten exclusive varieties. As the company's largest single product of compound thrombosis capsules, the current annual sales in the domestic eye disease drug first. In the decades of hard work in the pharmaceutical industry, the pharmaceutical industry has also formed its own unique experience. Long Chaofeng told reporters, first of all, the company formed a cooperation with the outside world research and development, production and research combined road. "By working with top teams to complement each other, it is easier to achieve new results in research and development." The second is the sensitivity to the market. The pharmaceutical industry firmly believes that only products with clinical and academic value have vitality. "We predict the future drug market, on the one hand, market competition will intensify, on the other hand, Chinese traditional medicine in addition to the advantages of Chinese medicine, mainly in the clinical synergy, in the clinical promotion will encounter greater obstacles." Long Chaofeng said.difficult to
it is easy to set a transformation strategy, but it is difficult to implement. Long Chaofeng admitted that the company initially also went through some detours.
first choice for the generics industry was generics, but as the company gained insight into the market, it was found that the development of generics alone was not the right path for the company. "Because the pharmaceutical industry in the Chinese medicine market is the exclusive varieties, patented varieties of experience, and generic drugs are not exclusive varieties, there are a large number of competitors. Spending a lot of energy on developing generic drugs at the same time, but also need to spend more energy to do market development. Long Chaofeng said. Thus, since 2010, the research and development direction of the pharmaceutical industry has mainly shifted to innovative drugs, focusing on small molecular compounds. Of course, in this direction, the company has also experienced repeated groping.
in the first phase, the company worked with a number of returning scientists to use their overseas research and development of innovative drugs for further research and development, but the results were not ideal. "We realized that individual scientists (or their teams) have a high level of research, but the platform is not big enough, and it's hard to get big results without a big platform." Drawing on the experience of the first stage, the company chose to cooperate with some university platforms in the second stage, and achieved some results. Long Chaofeng told reporters that there are some differences between the research orientation of colleges and universities and the pursuit of enterprises in research and development, colleges and universities are more pursuing academic theoretical value, and enterprises are pursuing more practical value, is "drug-oriented", there is a slight difference between the two. In the third stage, the company began to contact some of the country's top CRO enterprises, finalized the cooperation with drug Mingkang, which opened the company's new path of innovative drug research and development.Hand-hand medicine Mingkangde
asked why the final hand-in-hand medicine Mingkangde, Long Chaofeng talked with emotion about the original visit to the experimental base of the drug Mingkangde experience: "After the visit, I think that the drug Mingkangde is not only excellent hardware conditions, but also has a large number of excellent research and development personnel with an international perspective." The key is that Drug Mingkang can use the corporate culture to bring these talents together to form their core competitiveness. This is the ideal partner we are looking for.
the two sides experienced exploratory cooperation from 2013 to 2014, and finally signed a strategic cooperation agreement in 2015, signing 10 innovative drug projects, focusing on respiratory, tumor and non-alcoholic fatty hepatitis. Today, six of these projects have completed preclinical studies and submitted applications for clinical research registration, five of which have been approved for clinical trials and are at different stages of clinical trials.
Chaofeng introduced to reporters the example of ZSP1601, an innovative drug for the treatment of non-alcoholic fatty hepatitis (NASH), and ZSP1273, an innovative drug for the prevention and treatment of influenza A and human avian influenza. The ZSP1601 program, which was approved by the CFDA in October 2017, is the first small-molecule innovative drug approved clinically for the treatment of NASH in China, with a unique mechanism of action and the world's first innovative drug for the targeted treatment of NASH. NASH currently has a high prevalence rate in developed countries and regions, up to 15% to 40%, of which 10% to 20% of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease patients will develop into NASH patients, the incidence of NASH is expected to be 3% to 5% worldwide, it is worth noting that about 15% to 25% of NASH patients will develop cirrhosis. Authorities predict that by 2025 NASH will replace hepatitis C as the main disease requiring liver transplantation, and is becoming increasingly common among the world's chronic liver diseases. The new drug for NASH has been seen by the world's major pharmaceutical companies as the new blue sea of the future drug market, and Deutsche Bank even estimates that once NASH is on the market, it could reach $35 billion to $40 billion in the global market by 2025. But in such a huge market, there is no new drug actually on the market. Public information shows that the current global research NASH new drug project in the leading position is Intercept's Obe bile acid, Genfit's GFT-505 and other products, have entered the clinical phase III.
, ZSP1601 has a new chemical structure, a new target, a novel mechanism of action, has the potential to become First-In-Class drug. At present, there is no same target at home and abroad in the research of innovative drugs, with strong international competitiveness, the pharmaceutical industry will make full use of the first approved clinical opportunities, integration of advantageous resources, and rapidly promote the clinical research of this product. The ZSP1273 project is the first influenza virus RNA polymerase inhibitor in China to complete preclinical research and apply for registration. At present, we have completed the preclinical research work and submitted a clinical registration application to obtain the Notice of Acceptance.
World Health Organization estimates that a seasonal influenza pandemic could cause 3 to 5 million serious cases and 250,000 to 500,000 deaths worldwide each year. China is the most common place of influenza, the number of influenza cases each year is estimated to reach tens of millions of people. The annual economic cost of adult influenza disease in the United States alone is as high as $80 billion, and the adult influenza drug market is close to $10 billion. While existing anti-flu drugs are difficult to deal with the changing influenza virus, the role of vaccines is often escaped by influenza virus. Therefore, the market urgently needs new mechanisms of action of anti-flu drugs to meet the huge clinical needs.
August 21, the pharmaceutical industry and the domestic respiratory community "Taidou" Zhong Nanshan academician team signed a strategic cooperation framework agreement, Zhong Nanshan will become the company's ZSP1273 project II/III clinical trial project leader. In addition, Zhong Nanshan will jointly develop the inhaler form of ZSP1273 and ZSP1603, an innovative drug for the treatment of idiolytic pulmonary fibrosis. In this regard, Long Chaofeng is very excited. He said that the ZSP1273 project mechanism is clear, drug-effective target selectivity and in vitro activity is high, the body has good ability, high safety, and estave resistance virus strains and highly pathogenic avian influenza has a strong inhibitory effect, will make up for the existing standard treatment options, influenza and human avian influenza has a better therapeutic effect. "The company's partnership with Zhong academician is expected to jointly promote the early launch of the new drug."Mechanism is gradually becoming
August 20, the company announced that the company plans to take the hands of liver disease and respiratory research and development projects in the field of five innovative drug research and development projects to launch the establishment of innovative research and development holding subsidiary, the purpose is to attract talented people, promote the process of research and development projects, but also conducive to the creation of financing platform for innovative drug research and development projects, expand the financing channels for research and development projects, promote the early market of drugs.
In Long Chaofeng's view, this action means that the company's mechanism in innovative drug research and development is gradually becoming, relying on the creation of subsidiaries to build a new platform, to give innovative drug projects more independent mechanism and a broader space for development. Long Chaofeng told reporters that the company in the direction of innovative drugs has formed 5 clear ideas: First, to do more innovative projects, will not choose too mature, similar enterprises research and development more projects, because of fierce competition, and is not conducive to product formation of exclusive; Third, the focus is on areas that have not had a breakthrough in new drugs for more than a decade or two, and there is a strong demand for innovative drugs, and once successful, the market space will be vast. Fourth, the high investment in new drug research and development, long-term characteristics, the project alone on its own input, the process may not be ideal, the project needs to have a certain attraction to strategic investors. Fifth, can win the national major special qualifications, so that on the one hand can get support at the national level, while the project's further research and development and future listing paves the way. (Securities Times)