In September, the 2024 semi-annual reports of various companies have basically been disclosed.

 

According to statistics from Cyber ​​Blue, among the 493 A-share listed pharmaceutical companies (according to the industry classification of Tonghuashun, the same below), the number of companies with year-on-year decline and growth is close to "50-50" - 242 pharmaceutical companies have a year-on-year decline in revenue, accounting for 49% of the total; 252 have an increase in revenue, accounting for 51% of the total.

 

Among the 242 pharmaceutical companies whose revenue decreased compared with the same period last year, 40% of them fell by less than 10%; there were 12 companies with a decline of more than 50%, of which the company with the largest decline had a year-on-year revenue decline of more than 97%.

 

Among the 252 pharmaceutical companies with year-on-year revenue growth, 183 had an increase of less than 20%, accounting for more than 70% of the total number of growing companies; the number of companies that maintained a high growth of more than 30% was relatively small, totaling 33, accounting for 13% of the total number of growing companies, and about 7% of the total number of A-share pharmaceutical companies.

 

Among them, the revenue growth rate of 5 pharmaceutical companies exceeded 100%. The reasons for the super-high revenue growth of the 5 companies were different. The highest one had a year-on-year revenue growth of 103,398%, and the growth rate of the two companies following it also exceeded 1,000%.

 

In the first half of this year, the 5 companies whose revenue increased by more than 100% year-on-year were Yahong Pharmaceutical, Baili Tianheng, CanSino, Elis, and Notai Bio, with growth rates of about 103,398%, 1,685%, 1,071%, 111%, and 107%, respectively.

 

From the reasons for the high growth rate, Yahong Pharmaceutical and CanSino were related to the low base of the previous period.

 

Yahong Pharmaceutical's core products were still under development in the first half of 2023, with a revenue of only more than 77,000 yuan in the current period, which was the sporadic income reported and realized by its bladder cancer diagnosis and postoperative monitoring drug Heikewei and disposable cystoscope products as clinically urgently needed imported drugs and medical devices in the Boao Lecheng International Medical Tourism Pilot Zone in Hainan.

 

By the fourth quarter of 2023, Yahong Pharmaceutical's pazopanib tablets and neratinib maleate tablets began to be sold. In the first half of this year, commercial promotion was steadily promoted, sales increased, and finally achieved an operating income of 80.49 million yuan, an increase of 103,398%.

 

CanSino Biologics was affected by the estimated return of the new crown vaccine in the same period last year, and the current revenue was reduced by 237 million yuan. In the first half of this year, it achieved a 1071% increase on the basis of only 26 million yuan in revenue after the reduction. If this impact is excluded, its revenue growth rate in the first half of this year is about 15.4%.

 

Due to the effectiveness of the product license-out transaction, Baili Tianheng received a high down payment in the first half of this year, and finally became the second fastest growing pharmaceutical company with an increase of 1658%.

 

In the first half of this year, Baili Tianheng's total revenue was 5.553 billion yuan, of which drug sales revenue was 220 million yuan and innovative drug BD revenue was 5.33 billion yuan, mainly for the irrevocable and non-deductible down payment of 800 million US dollars paid by BMS to it.

 

According to the agreement with BMS, Baili Tianheng can obtain up to US$500 million in recent contingent payments; after achieving certain specific development, registration and sales milestones, Baili Tianheng can also obtain milestone payments of up to US$7.1 billion.

 

It is reported that Baili Tianheng and BMS have reached a cooperation on their tumor drug BL-B01D1. BL-B01D1 is the world's first and only dual-antibody ADC targeting EGFR×HER3 that has entered the clinical stage. It can widely target a variety of solid tumors and is more enriched in tumor tissues, thereby enhancing tumor killing activity and reducing target toxicity.

 

According to BMS's second quarter performance disclosure this year, the BL-B01D1 single-drug dose bridging clinical study conducted by Baili Tianheng and BMS in the United States is expanding its indications from non-small cell lung cancer to small cell lung cancer, breast cancer, esophageal cancer, nasopharyngeal cancer, etc.

 

As of the disclosure of Baili Tianheng's semi-annual report, BL-B01D1 is undergoing more than 20 clinical trials in China and the United States for the treatment of various tumor types, including lung cancer, breast cancer, head and neck squamous cell carcinoma, nasopharyngeal carcinoma, gastric cancer, colorectal cancer, liver cancer, biliary tract cancer, urothelial carcinoma and gynecological cancer.

 

However, including BL-B01D1, all of Baili Tianheng's innovative candidate drugs are in the clinical and preclinical development stages. As the project progresses, R&D expenditures will continue to increase, and the funds it can rely on, in addition to traditional drug revenue, are the down payment obtained from this transaction with BMS.

 

With the official implementation of the new version of the medical insurance catalogue this year, the products in the catalogue have also ushered in good news, including Eli Lilly's vometinib tablets.

 

It is reported that Eli Lilly's core product is its independently developed Class I new drug, vometinib mesylate tablets, which is used to treat patients with epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) mutation-positive non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). The second-line treatment indication of vometinib was approved for marketing in March 2021; the first-line treatment indication was approved for marketing in June 2022.

 

At the beginning of last year, the first-line treatment indication of vometinib was included in the medical insurance catalog through the negotiation and renewal of new indications during the agreement period. With the gradual improvement of the sales team and channels, its sales continued to grow and its market share steadily increased. Eli Lilly's operating income in the first half of this year increased by 110.57% to 1.576 billion yuan.

 

Against the background of national policy support, improved medical technology level and increased clinical demand, the domestic anti-tumor drug market has gradually expanded.

 

According to the Frost & Sullivan report, from 2018 to 2023, the scale of the domestic anti-tumor drug market will increase from 157.5 billion yuan to 269 billion yuan, with an annual compound growth rate of 11.30%. It is estimated that by 2030, the domestic anti-tumor drug market will reach 581.7 billion yuan. Among them, the accessibility of anti-tumor drugs included in the medical insurance catalog will be further improved.

 

In the first half of 2024, the operating income of Notai Bio increased by 107.47% year-on-year, making it the fifth fastest growing company in the A-share pharmaceutical sector, with total revenue exceeding 831 million yuan, of which more than 50% came from overseas business.

 

As a biopharmaceutical company focusing on independent research and development of peptide drugs and small molecule drugs combined with customized research and development and production, Notai Bio's business revenue including generic drugs including APIs and preparations increased by 119.76% year-on-year in the first half of this year, reaching 545 million yuan.

 

It is reported that it has built a product pipeline covering semaglutide, liraglutide, telportide, lanreotide acetate, oseltamivir phosphate, thymosin, eptifibatide and other varieties around the treatment of diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, tumors and other diseases.

 

Last year, Notai Biotech successively obtained the FDA DMF First Adequate Letter for APIs such as liraglutide and semaglutide, indicating that its APIs have passed the FDA technical review; in February this year, Notai Biotech's telpotide API obtained the world's first US FDA DMF.

 

Based on GLP-1 drug APIs, Notai Biotech's business has penetrated globally-

 

In the domestic market, it has reached a strategic cooperation on GLP-1 innovative drug APIs and preparations;

In the European market, Notai Biotech has carried out oral semaglutide and telpotide API cooperation with many leading generic drug companies;

In the American market, it has reached a cooperation on APIs for liraglutide preparations in the US market, signed a strategic cooperation agreement on semaglutide preparations in South America, and reached cooperation on the first generic APIs for liraglutide preparations;

In the Indian market, it has also reached a cooperation on the global launch of liraglutide preparations with leading generic drug companies.

 

In its annual report, Notai Biotech mentioned that it has independently chosen "generic drugs with high technical barriers and good market prospects" to start its layout.

 

For example, in the large-scale production of long-chain peptide drugs with extremely high technical barriers, most manufacturers in the industry have a single batch level of grams or hundreds of grams. Notai Bio said that after years of independent research and development, it has broken through the technical bottleneck, and the single batch output of long-chain modified peptide drugs such as semaglutide and abovetide has exceeded 10 kilograms, reaching the advanced level of the industry.

 

In the future, as the patent of semaglutide expires and downstream generic drug preparations gradually enter commercialization, related raw material pharmaceutical companies may once again usher in a peak of growth.

By editor