Which of the top innovative pharmaceutical companies has the strongest R&D strength?

Domestic listed pharmaceutical companies will maintain high growth in R&D investment

Up to now, relevant ministries and commissions such as the State Council, the State Food and Drug Administration, and the National Health Commission have successively issued a number of relevant documents to encourage innovation.

At the same time, reviewing the results of medical insurance negotiations in the past three years, on the one hand, the number of negotiated products has shown an increasing trend, and the participation of domestic products has continued to increase, reflecting the continued prosperity of the current domestic innovative drug market; on the other hand, innovative products have been included in medical insurance negotiations.

Looking at the world, global pharmaceutical research and development will maintain a rapid growth trend in the future.

The enthusiasm for global new drug research and development has continued to promote the continued growth of the drug market.

Global pharmaceutical R&D investment

Data source: Southwest Securities Research Report, Zhongkang Industrial Capital Research Center

In this context, the R&D investment in my country's innovative drug market continues to increase.

Picture of R&D investment of Chinese A-share listed pharmaceutical companies

Data source: Wind, Zhongkang Industrial Capital Research Center

Leading innovative pharmaceutical companies take a multi-pronged approach to enhance R&D strength

At present, some domestic A-share listed innovative drug companies, such as Hengrui Pharmaceuticals, Betta Pharmaceuticals, Junshi Biology, and Chipset Biology, are strengthening their R&D capabilities from multiple dimensions such as R&D expenditures, attracting talents, and optimizing incentive mechanisms.

Chart: Research and development status of top listed innovative pharmaceutical companies in the past three years

Data source: company annual report, Zhongkang Industrial Capital Research Center

1.

Hengrui Pharmaceuticals is a representative enterprise of domestic pharmaceutical innovation and high-quality development, as well as one of the most typical representatives of independent R&D transformation among domestic listed companies.

From the perspective of R&D investment, the cash flow provided by generic drugs guarantees the sustainability of corporate R&D investment, making its innovation safety margin higher.

In terms of R&D personnel reserves, the number of R&D personnel of Hengrui Medicine has increased from 3,116 in 2017 to 4,721 in 2020, and the proportion of the total number has also increased from 14.

In terms of innovative drugs, Hengrui Medicine has accumulated 7 innovative drugs, including Irecoxib, Apatinib mesylate, Thiopefilgrastim, Pirotinib maleate, Carrelizumab, Remazolam tosylate and fluzoparil have been approved for marketing.

In recent years, the growth in sales of innovative drugs has been the main driving force behind Hengrui Pharmaceutical's performance growth.

2.

Established in 2003, Betta Pharmaceuticals is a national high-tech enterprise founded by a team of overseas returnees, focusing on research and development of new drugs with independent intellectual property rights and integrating pharmaceutical R&D, production and marketing.

Innovation is the foundation of Betta Pharmaceuticals and the driving force for sustainable development.

The heavy investment in research and development has brought rich returns.

3.
Junshi Biology's R&D expenditure is more than double the revenue

Junshi Bio is an innovation-driven biopharmaceutical company with complete industrial chain capabilities from innovative drug discovery, global clinical research and development, large-scale production to commercialization.
The company aims to develop first-in-class (first-in-class) or best-in-class (best-in-class) drugs through source innovation.
Through outstanding innovative drug discovery capabilities, strong biotechnology research and development capabilities, and large-scale production technologies, Has successfully developed a drug portfolio under research with great market potential.

The company’s core product JS001 is the first domestically produced anti-PD-1 monoclonal antibody approved by the National Food and Drug Administration; JS002 and UBP1213 are the first anti-PCSK9 monoclonal antibodies and anti-BLyS monoclonal antibodies approved by the National Food and Drug Administration for the first time in China.
Cloned antibody; TAB004/JS004 is the company’s self-developed and world’s first anti-BTLA monoclonal antibody.
It has been approved by the US FDA and NMPA for clinical trials.
It is currently conducting clinical trials in China and the United States; the company is also working with domestic scientific research institutions to fight the epidemic , To jointly develop the new coronavirus neutralizing antibody JS016.

As of the end of 2020, the company has 30 products under development, including 28 innovative drugs, 2 biosimilar drugs, covering five major therapeutic areas, including malignant tumors, autoimmune system diseases, chronic metabolic diseases, neurological diseases and infections Class of diseases.

In order to more effectively support drug research and development, the company invests a large amount of research and development investment every year.
In 2019 and 2020, R&D investment accounted for 122.
06% and 112.
72% of revenue, respectively, and the R&D team increased from 415 to 667.
Continuous R&D investment and personnel reserves will also provide a strong guarantee for the company’s R&D product pipeline layout.
.

4.
The research and development expenditures of Microchip Biotechnology account for over 50%

Microchip Biosciences focuses on the research and development of original innovative drugs in the five fields of malignant tumors, diabetes and other metabolic diseases, autoimmune diseases, antiviral fields, and central nervous system.
Integrated drug innovation and early evaluation of the core technology system, using the concept of omics, successfully created the "First in class" drug chidamide.

In addition, the company's overall pipeline layout is extensive.
In preclinical trials, it has also deployed tumors (PD-1/PD-L1, SHP2, p53, RAS and IDO), metabolic diseases (TRβ and ASK1), and autoimmune diseases (TYK2).
And central nervous system diseases (TRβ), etc.
, as the new R&D and production base in Chengdu is put into operation, the company will also enter the large-molecule innovative drugs.

In terms of R&D investment, the company's R&D investment in 2018, 2019 and 2020 accounted for 55.
85%, 45.
02% and 50.
94% of revenue respectively; R&D personnel increased from 104 in 2018 to 191 in 2020, and the number of R&D personnel Nearly doubled.

5.
Strengthen equity incentives and bind core talents

At the same time, in order to retain and bind core talents for a long time, domestic listed innovative drug companies have also implemented equity incentive plans to ensure the stability of core personnel.

From the perspective of equity incentives, Hengrui Pharmaceuticals, a leading domestic innovative drug company in the early market, has conducted 4 equity incentives since its listing.
The incentive method is to issue restricted stocks to incentive targets, and use operating income and net profit as performance evaluations.
index.

In addition, up to now, innovative drug companies such as Betta Pharmaceuticals, Junshi Biology, and Chipset Biology have also implemented two equity incentive plans.
The incentive methods include stock options, restricted stocks and stock appreciation rights.
The specific equity incentive situation is as follows:

Data source: Zhongkang Industrial Capital Research Center

Concluding remarks

Looking to the future, based on the current medical insurance negotiation system that has gradually improved, it has gradually become the norm for innovative drugs to be included in the medical insurance negotiation catalogue at a significant price reduction at the initial stage of the market.
Rapidly advancing research and development to seize first-mover advantages and reasonable pricing strategies have become innovative drugs.
An important factor in market competition.

Under the joint promotion of policies, capital, talents and other factors, pharmaceutical companies with outstanding R&D capabilities and strong new drug creation capabilities will stand out.
The R&D and market strategies of pharmaceutical companies will usher in a major transformation.
Innovative pharmaceutical companies will benefit from the favorable policies.
Thus usher in unprecedented development opportunities.
Therefore, continuous R&D investment and high-end R&D personnel reserves will be the key to future innovative pharmaceutical companies to stand out and enter the international arena.

In addition, the products launched by Chinese domestic innovative drug companies will shift from Me-too and Me-better drugs with a lower level of innovation to First in class and Best in class drugs with a higher level of innovation.

In the long run, with the growth of the number of innovative pharmaceutical companies and the scale of pipelines, products with the same target and similar mechanisms will become more dense.
With the deepening of medical insurance negotiations and volume procurement, innovative pharmaceutical companies with differentiation tend Only with greater bargaining space and independent pricing power, so as to achieve faster cash flow recovery and enter the virtuous cycle of R&D-IPO.