Global Times | 2026 China FIC Innovation & Collaboration Summit Held in San Francisco, Chinese Pharmaceutical Companies Showcase Innovative Achievements

Editor’s Note: The 2026 J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference (JPM) in San Francisco is an annual global gathering for the biopharmaceutical industry. During the conference, the 2026 China FIC Innovation & Collaboration Summit was successfully held, showcasing China’s innovative capabilities and achievements in cutting-edge pharmaceutical technologies and international collaboration.

Global Times and its overseas social media platforms, including Facebook and X, covered and promoted the summit, highlighting the growing presence of Chinese innovators on the international stage. Among them were Sungen Biomed, a strategically controlled company of Hotgen Biotech, Youngen Biotech, an equity-invested company of Hotgen Biotech, as well as InnoMed, Yufang Biotech, FuruBio, Yanming Biotech, Ruijian Biopharma, Huayilejian, Kangchen Pharmaceutical, and Alphamab Oncology.

The summit represented an important step in bringing China’s biopharmaceutical innovations to the global stage while opening a new window for international industry collaboration and exchange.

During the 2026 J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference, the 2026 China FIC Innovation & Collaboration Summit was successfully held in San Francisco. The First-in-Class (FIC) Innovation Drug Strategic Development Alliance (ZFIC Alliance), together with Chinese innovative pharmaceutical companies including Youngen Biotech and Sungen Biomed, made a collective appearance at the event, showcasing cutting-edge technology platforms and key R&D pipelines and attracting broad attention from the global biopharmaceutical industry.

Dr. Zili Li, Chief Strategy Officer of the ZFIC Alliance, delivered a keynote speech titled “China Biotech Innovation: A Regulatory Perspective.”

Xinxin Li, Chief Overseas Market Advisor at Pharmcube, delivered a keynote speech titled “Insights into China’s Innovative Drug R&D and Transaction Trends.”

During the summit, Dr. Zili Li, Chief Strategy Officer of the ZFIC Alliance, delivered a keynote speech entitled “China Biotech Innovation: A Regulatory Perspective,” providing an analysis of the development pathway of China’s biopharmaceutical innovation from a regulatory perspective. Xinxin Li, Chief Overseas Market Advisor at Pharmcube, shared insights under the title “Insights into China’s Innovative Drug R&D and Transaction Trends,” examining the latest trends in China’s innovative drug R&D and transactions and providing valuable perspectives for the industry.

Youngen Biotech delivered a keynote speech titled “The Rising Power of China in RNAi Therapeutics.”

Sungen Biomed delivered a keynote speech titled “High-quality clinical trials support innovative drug development — SGC001, the world’s first antibody drug for myocardial infarction.”

At the event, participating guests engaged in in-depth discussions on changes in the global pharmaceutical innovation landscape, pathways for Chinese pharmaceutical companies to expand internationally, and new models for cross-border collaboration, generating a wealth of insights and ideas.

Youngen Biotech delivered a keynote speech titled “The Rising Power of China in RNAi Therapeutics,” highlighting the growing strength of Chinese innovation in the small nucleic acid therapeutics sector and noting that China has emerged as a global leader in small nucleic acid drug innovation.

Sungen Biomed presented “High-quality clinical trials support innovative drug development — SGC001, the world’s first antibody drug for myocardial infarction.” Drawing on the clinical development experience of SGC001, a first-in-class antibody therapeutic for acute myocardial infarction, the presentation highlighted the efficiency of China’s innovative drug clinical development capabilities.

Sungen Biomed presented “SGT003: FIC/BIC, a Safe and Efficient Bispecific Antibody for Tumor Immunotherapy.”

At the summit, several Chinese pharmaceutical companies showcased their core technology platforms and key R&D pipelines, highlighting the strong R&D capabilities of China’s biopharmaceutical industry.\

Youngen Biotech’s independently developed Kardia Shuttle™ cardiac-targeting delivery technology platform is designed to enable precise delivery of multiple types of therapeutics, including siRNA and ASO, to cardiac tissue. Based on this platform, Youngen Biotech is advancing the development of cardiac-targeted therapeutics, with relevant pipelines having completed efficacy validation from mouse models to large-animal studies, marking a new stage in their development.

2026 China FIC Innovation & Collaboration Summit

Sungen Biomed has established a diversified technology platform matrix to support innovative drug development. At the summit, the company officially unveiled its independently developed SG Linker-Payload antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) technology platform.

The platform features a highly hydrophilic Linker-Payload structure in its molecular design, which may improve drug stability, extend in vivo half-life, and reduce the risk of nonspecific clearance, providing a new technological approach for ADC drug development.

During the summit, Sungen Biomed also announced development updates for two key drug candidates, attracting significant industry attention.

For SGC001, an antibody therapeutic targeting acute myocardial infarction, a Phase II clinical trial has officially been initiated. Another major oncology pipeline, SGT003, released its preclinical results for the first time. Featuring a dual mechanism of action — “precisely eliminating Tregs in the tumor microenvironment while activating antitumor immunity” — SGT003 is being developed with the aim of reducing the immune-related adverse effects associated with conventional CTLA-4 antibodies. The company plans to initiate dual IND submissions in China and the United States in 2026.

Chairman Lin Changqing of Hotgen Biotech said at the summit that the company has consistently focused on the development of original innovative medicines based on novel targets and novel mechanisms of action. Guided by the innovation pathway of “first discovery by Chinese scientists, first R&D and translation by a Chinese company, and first clinical research by a Chinese hospital,” the company is committed to advancing innovative achievements through entirely new technologies and therapeutic approaches.

According to the company, Sungen Biomed, a strategically controlled company of Hotgen Biotech, and Youngen Biotech, an equity-invested company of Hotgen Biotech, both emphasize improving R&D efficiency and pursuing differentiated development. They have adopted “racing against time to shorten R&D cycles” as a guiding principle while focusing on their respective core strengths and building competitiveness through differentiated innovation.

While remaining committed to independent innovation, these companies also embrace a global vision of open collaboration and actively engage in international exchanges and partnerships. Youngen Biotech, for example, was invited to participate in Bayer’s Co.Lab co-creation platform activities, while Sungen Biomed participated in BIO-Europe 2025, promoting the integration of Chinese pharmaceutical innovations into the global pharmaceutical ecosystem through technology partnerships, knowledge sharing, and other forms of collaboration.

Looking ahead, participating guests broadly agreed that the development of pharmaceutical innovation in China requires coordinated efforts across government, enterprises, and the broader industry to jointly promote high-quality development.

At the policy level, further improvements to supportive policies and the innovation environment are needed to provide full-chain support for drug R&D, translation, and commercialization. At the enterprise level, companies need to continuously strengthen talent development and platform building, orient R&D toward clinical needs, and deliver more innovative products with meaningful clinical value.

At the industry level, a collaborative innovation ecosystem integrating government, industry, academia, research institutions, and healthcare institutions should be established to deepen cooperation among universities, research institutions, companies, and hospitals, accelerate the translation of innovative achievements, and build international collaboration platforms that facilitate the global expansion of Chinese pharmaceutical innovations.

The global pharmaceutical industry is currently entering a new phase of innovation driven by novel targets and mechanisms of action, with FIC (First-in-Class) drug development becoming an important area of industry competition. As cross-border technology collaboration and industrial integration accelerate, the global pharmaceutical innovation landscape continues to evolve, creating favorable conditions for Chinese pharmaceutical companies to participate in global competition and expand their development opportunities.

From target discovery to technology translation, and from clinical research to market application, the boundaries of innovation continue to expand, driving the pharmaceutical industry toward greater precision and efficiency.

In China, the combined support of policy, industry, and capital has laid a solid foundation for pharmaceutical innovation and R&D. An industrial ecosystem integrating talent, capital, and technology has taken shape, while the full industry chain from early-stage R&D to clinical development and manufacturing is gradually becoming more complete. A growing number of biotechnology companies with a global vision are rapidly emerging, providing full-chain support for innovative drug development.

2026 China FIC Innovation & Collaboration Summit

From their collective appearance at the San Francisco Summit to the strong attention they have received from the global industry, Chinese biopharmaceutical companies are actively participating in global pharmaceutical innovation.

Driven by supportive policies, corporate efforts, and industry collaboration, China’s pharmaceutical industry is expected to play an increasingly important role in the global innovation landscape and inject new vitality into the development of the global pharmaceutical industry.

Source: Global Times App: https://hqtime.huanqiu.com/share/article/4PyoYXZLm3m