Chinese drug makers strike a record US$136 billion in out-licensing deals in 2025

Chinese drug makers’ licensing deals more than doubled in 2025 from a year earlier to a record high, propelled by dozens of multibillion-dollar agreements between Hong Kong and mainland China-listed firms and global pharmaceutical giants.\nLast year, 157 out-licensing deals worth US$135.7 billion were signed, compared with 94 transactions worth US$51.9 billion in 2024, state media reported, citing data released by the National Medical Products Administration (NMPA), China’s drugs regulator, last week.\nOut-licensing agreements typically refer to a company granting another firm the exclusive rights to further develop, manufacture and commercialise a drug once it has entered clinical trials in humans, in return for upfront payments, milestone fees and royalties on future sales.\nAmong the top deals was Suzhou-based GeneQuantum’s US$13 billion contract with US-based Biohaven Pharmaceutical and South Korea’s AimedBio last January, involving antibody drug conjugates – cancer medicines that use an antibody to deliver the drug to kill tumour cells.\n\nIn May, Shenyang-based drug maker 3SBio signed a US$6 billion licensing agreement with US multinational Pfizer for its SSGJ-707 cancer drug.\nIn July, Jiangsu Hengrui Pharmaceuticals, China’s largest drug company by market capitalisation, signed a US$12.5 billion deal with the UK’s GlaxoSmithKline for a drug called HRS-9821 to treat chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, a progressive lung condition.\nThe growth follows regulatory support. Last year, China approved 76 innovative drugs, including 47 chemical drugs and 23 biologics, up 58 per cent from 48 approvals in 2024, according to Chinese media. Biologics are medicines that are derived from organic life and are used to treat severe diseases by targeting specific parts of the immune system.\nLan Gongtao, deputy director general of the Department of Drug Registration at the NMPA, said on January 3 that regulators had accelerated reviews of innovative therapies.\nThe sharp increase in out-licensing deals “reflects international recognition of the value of China’s innovative drugs” and shows “the country has become an important force in global biopharmaceutical innovation”, Lan said.\nInternational pharmaceutical giants, including AstraZeneca, Merck, Roche, Takeda and Bristol Myers Squibb, have been racing to strike deals with Chinese drug developers as they confront looming “patent cliffs” before 2030 that put about US$171 billion of large-cap biopharma companies’ 2025 revenue at risk.\nMeanwhile, analysts expect global appetite for Chinese early-stage drug assets to remain robust this year.\n“China biotechs’ out-licensing will go on as China-based assets represent a timely, cost-effective answer to multinational corporations’ challenges,” said Cui Cui, head of healthcare research for Asia at US investment bank Jefferies, in a recent note.\nGoldman Sachs said in a research note last month that Chinese biopharmaceutical companies were becoming increasingly prominent in the development of new therapies and “they are capturing a growing share of global drug licensing deals”.\nDespite the commercial momentum, geopolitical tensions continue to complicate US-China biotech collaboration.\nThe Biosecure Act, which US President Donald Trump signed in December, restricts contracts with Chinese biotech firms deemed national security risks. It also aims to curb US investment in Chinese technologies with potential military applications.\n