(Yicai) June 17 -- China is one of the most dynamic and innovative markets in the world, making it supportive and important for UCB, according to the chief executive of the Belgium-rooted global biopharmaceutical company..

"For us at UCB, this last year has been a year where we have developed our innovation network here," Jean-Christophe Tellier, who is also chairman of the executive committee at the Brussels-based company, said in an interview with Yicai on June 4. “We are actively engaging in the China’s National Reimbursement Drug List (NRDL) process. We have new indications approved and new medicines launched this year, and 14 clinicaI studies are running here.”

"We have just completed the acquisition of Candid Therapeutics, which is a US company but based on China innovation, and signed a licensing-in deal with Antengene for T-cell engagers," Tellier noted. "I feel really confident and positive about this evolution because we are closer to our reason to be and our purpose.

"With the people that I met, there is such a great speed of change and ability to integrate innovations here. We had a visit to the Bio-park in Beijing," he said. "Everywhere I visited I can feel and see these notions of what innovation means for the system, but also for people. And this is something that resonates for UCB.

"We try to be stronger where we are already good. It's almost a marketing concept applied to research," Tellier pointed out.

"If you continue to push to be even better where you are already very good, then you are unique, then you develop something nobody else can have," he stressed. “That's exactly what we're trying to do in auto-immune diseases.”

"Immunology is one of our cores, along with neurology," he pointed out. “Antibody engineering is really something where we have developed over the years, a very strong excellence.”

"So the acquisitions we have made -- T-cell engagers and bispecifics -- are very close to our core," Tellier said. "It's a nice complement, a natural complement, and an accelerator of what we are currently already very good at. That is the strategic rationale.”

UCB has forged alliances with several Chinese companies, including AiLux and Bioray Bio. In addition, its new integrated operations center in Suzhou will enable it to strengthen its commercialization and distribution capabilities, while also equipping it with a full-fledged ecosystem platform to guarantee stable supply chains.

"First of all, the business model we are supporting is really about partnerships for a couple of reasons," Tellier said. "One is research and human biology, which is so complex, and there are so many new things coming in, that it's important to stay connected as much as possible and to leverage the knowledge where the knowledge has been created, and China is not the last country when we talk about knowledge and innovation.

"We have been able to collaborate and partner with certain Chinese companies," he noted. “The deal with Antengene and the acquisition of Candid Therapeutics are another demonstration of this partnership and this connectivity.”

"Connection is an important component of our business model because in the pharma industry, even if you are a leader somewhere, you cannot assume that you can be aware of all the latest knowledge that exists," he pointed out. "It's very important to maintain this connection. Partnerships are mainly on track everywhere, but we are observing, looking, and connecting, and I am very confident that partnerships will continue to develop in China with Chinese companies."

Editor: Martin Kadiev