Every reporter: Chen Xing Every editor: Huang Sheng
In the hidden corners of men's health in China, a market battle lasting over twenty years is ushering in a new change.
Once, a small blue pill defined an era. As the world's first oral ED (erectile dysfunction) treatment drug, Pfizer's Viagra burst onto the scene in 1998 and entered China in 2000, making the term &#34;Viagra&#34; synonymous with this category. Following closely, Eli Lilly's Cialis entered the market with a differentiated positioning of &#34;36-hour efficacy,&#34; forming a three-way competition among foreign brands with Viagra and Bayer's Levitra. Until 2014, Baiyunshan's Jin Ge made its debut as the first domestic generic, tearing open a gap with its price advantage and rewriting the market into a new situation of &#34;domestic brands leading, original research drugs retreating.&#34;
However, as time moves to 2026, the stories behind these three names are being rewritten. Viagra faces continuous decline after its patent cliff, Cialis is gradually being divested by its parent company Eli Lilly, and Jin Ge, which had been advancing rapidly, is also facing its own &#34;mid-life crisis.&#34;
<h2>&#34;Viagra&#34; in China: 20 Years of Listing at the Crossroads of Fate</h2>
Viagra, Cialis, and Jin Ge all belong to a class of drugs—PDE5 inhibitors. They share the same pharmacological mechanism, but their origins, ingredients, and status in the market are vastly different.
Viagra is the source of the term &#34;Viagra.&#34; Its active ingredient is sildenafil citrate, developed by Pfizer, and it is the world's first oral ED drug, also the undisputed symbol of this category. For over a decade after its launch, it almost monopolized the global market.
Cialis, on the other hand, is the &#34;underdog&#34; that made a comeback. Its active ingredient is tadalafil, developed by Eli Lilly, and it entered China in 2005. The biggest difference from Viagra lies in the duration of its effect—Cialis lasts for 36 hours and is the only PDE5 inhibitor approved for the treatment of both ED and benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH).
Jin Ge is a latecomer and a disruptor. It has the same ingredient as Viagra, which is sildenafil, but it is a domestic generic drug. When it was launched in 2014, Baiyunshan set a simple and brutal strategy: a 30% price reduction for the same dosage, halving the single-use dosage, resulting in a 60% lower cost per use for patients compared to the original research drug. This move reshaped the landscape for the next decade.
Since Viagra's entry into China in 2000, the market for this urological drug has undergone a commercial transformation from &#34;foreign monopoly&#34; to &#34;domestic substitution,&#34; and then to &#34;chaotic competition.&#34; Foreign brands have shifted from monopoly to being &#34;divested,&#34; while domestic generics have gone from rapid growth to a downturn, bringing this old drug once again to a crossroads of fate.
Among them, Viagra, as the pioneer, has fallen from being a &#34;miracle drug&#34; priced at over a hundred yuan per pill to a participant in the price war, yet it still occupies a place in the outpatient market due to its brand accumulation.
Cialis, as a differentiated competitor, has transitioned from being a core asset of Eli Lilly to a non-core business being divested, but after shifting to the outpatient market under Menarini, it still retains approximately 935 million yuan in sales in 2024
Jin Ge, as a pioneer of domestic alternatives, rose to the top of the industry from scratch but fell into the dilemma of &#34;declining volume and price&#34; amid the competition in generic drugs. Meanwhile, a new batch of domestic innovative drugs is attempting to escape the quagmire of price wars through differentiated clinical value.
<h2>Cialis &#34;Exits&#34;: From Star Product to Divested Asset</h2>
The story of Cialis is a typical textbook case of the lifecycle of a branded drug.
In 2007, Cialis's global sales first surpassed $1.2 billion, closely approaching the sales figures of Viagra that year. By 2017, its global sales peaked at $2.323 billion. However, after that, the expiration of patents and the impact of generic drugs caused this growth curve to plummet.
In the Chinese market, Cialis faced another blow. In April 2020, the patent for its ED use expired in China. In the same year, tadalafil was included in the second batch of the national drug procurement catalog, and Eli Lilly failed to win the bid. That year, Cialis's sales in hospitals dropped nearly 60%. The consequences of losing the bid were immediate—data from 2024 showed that among public hospitals, over 30% of tadalafil sales were accounted for by Chengdu Tianqing, while the original branded Cialis accounted for less than 20%.
In 2021, Eli Lilly sold the rights to Cialis in the mainland Chinese market to the Italian biopharmaceutical company Menarini. At that time, Eli Lilly stated in a media interview that this move was to concentrate resources to accelerate the development of Eli Lilly's pharmaceutical business in five major therapeutic areas: diabetes, oncology, autoimmune diseases, pain, and neurodegenerative diseases. Once a blockbuster product, it has since become a &#34;non-core asset&#34; of the parent company.
Today, this divestment continues. In March 2026, Yuli Pharmaceutical announced the acquisition of all rights to Cialis in Hong Kong, Macau, and South Korea, including trademark rights, product registration approvals, and production technology licenses. After the completion of this acquisition, Yuli Pharmaceutical expanded its market presence for Cialis in Asia from 8 to 11 regions.
However, after shifting to the outpatient market, Cialis found a new space for survival. Data from Minet shows that in 2024, Cialis's sales in hospitals were only 53.2 million yuan, but sales in pharmacies and online stores reached 426 million yuan and 509 million yuan, respectively, totaling 935 million yuan.
On March 24, reporters sent inquiries regarding Cialis's rights plans in other regional markets to Eli Lilly's email, but had not received a response by the time of publication.
<h2>Jin Ge's &#34;Midlife Crisis&#34;: From Rapid Growth to Downturn</h2>
If Cialis's exit is the fate of branded drugs, then Jin Ge's decline reflects the collective dilemma of the generic drug market.
Jin Ge is a core product of Baiyunshan, with sales exceeding 700 million yuan in its first year on the market. In 2016, its market share soared to 49%, surpassing Viagra to become the industry leader. In 2017, its market share further rose to 55%, firmly holding the top position. In 2019, Jin Ge officially surpassed Viagra in both sales revenue and volume, becoming the number one ED drug in China. In 2023, Jin Ge's sales reached a historical peak of 1.29 billion yuan, with sales volume exceeding 100 million tablets, and its gross margin maintained above 90% for a long time
It is not only the most profitable product of Baiyunshan but has also become a symbolic case of the resurgence of domestic generic drugs.
However, the turning point will arrive in 2024. Baiyunshan's annual report shows that the sales of Jinge fell nearly 20% year-on-year, with sales volume dropping over 10% and inventory surging nearly 50%. In 2025, the decline continues—annual sales are about 79.87 million tablets, nearly 8 million fewer than the previous year, with revenue down 26.18% year-on-year. This marks the second consecutive year of decline for Jinge after its first dual drop in sales and revenue in 2024.
As of March 2025, nearly 50 domestic companies have obtained approval for sildenafil generic drugs, with a total of 137 generic drug applications accepted; the number of tadalafil generic drug companies has exceeded 70, with over 100 approved documents (including multiple specifications).
The direct consequence of the influx of players is a price war. In 2020, Qilu Pharmaceutical's sildenafil citrate tablets were quoted at 2.08 yuan per tablet, a reduction of 92%, becoming the only exclusive bid winner in that year's centralized procurement, while Jinge and Viagra were both eliminated. By the first half of 2023, Qianwei's market share in public hospitals was nearly twice that of Viagra, while Jinge's sales in public hospitals had almost dropped to zero.
Even in the outpatient market, the price war has not ceased. On e-commerce platforms, the maximum discount price for Viagra 50mg tablets has dropped to 29.8 yuan per tablet, a reduction of over 70% from the initial price of over 100 yuan. Jinge's products of the same specification have also long since left the 100 yuan era.
Jinge's &#34;mid-life crisis&#34; is essentially the inevitable result of the peak of generic drug dividends. When the time window for first generics closes, when the price war hits the floor price, and when the squeeze on the existing market approaches its limit, the growth story can no longer be told. However, from the perspective of Baiyunshan's main products, Jinge remains its highest revenue product.
<h2>How to Break Through?</h2>
If the &#34;involution&#34; on the supply side is the obvious line of this change, then the changes on the demand side are deeper undercurrents.
Faced with the predicament, players are seeking new breakthrough directions. Formulation innovation is one path. A search of the National Medical Products Administration database shows that the forms are becoming increasingly diverse, from ordinary tablets to orally disintegrating tablets and dry mixed suspensions. New formulations such as orally disintegrating tablets, oral suspensions, and oral dissolving films attempt to capture users from traditional tablets with experiences like &#34;no need for drinking water,&#34; &#34;melts in the mouth,&#34; and &#34;discreet consumption.&#34;
Domestic Class 1 innovative drugs have also begun to emerge intensively this year. On July 8 and July 22, 2025, two domestic ED new drugs were consecutively approved: Angweida (sildenafil citrate tablets) from Wangshan Wangshui and Taituotuo (tadalafil tablets) from Yangtze River Pharmaceutical, attempting to challenge the existing pattern of PDE5 inhibitors with better side effect profiles and higher selectivity.
From the era of the &#34;blue pill&#34; initiated by Viagra, this game is now entering a new stage. Original research drugs are being stripped away, generic drugs are undergoing involution, new formulations are breaking through, and the demand side is changing. When the &#34;Viagras&#34; collectively face a mid-life crisis, the real question may not be &#34;who will win,&#34; but rather, what new stories can still grow in this market?
Daily Economic News

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In the Chinese male health market, Pfizer's Viagra, Eli Lilly's Cialis, and GYBYS's Jin Ge are facing changes. Viagra continues to shrink due to patent expiration, Cialis is gradually being divested by Eli Lilly, and Jin Ge is also encountering a mid-life crisis. Since their launch in 2000, the market landscape for these three drugs has undergone significant changes, with domestic brands gradually dominating the market

- The Chinese erectile dysfunction (ED) medication market is undergoing significant changes, shifting from foreign dominance to domestic competition over the past twenty years.  
- Pfizer's Viagra, the first oral ED treatment, is facing declines as it approaches a patent cliff, while Eli Lilly's Cialis is being divested by its parent company and domestic rival Jin Ge encounters a downturn.  
- As competition intensifies, new domestic innovations are emerging, seeking to carve out market space amid evolving consumer demands and a saturated environment.

"Viagra" products collectively face a midlife crisis: Eli Lilly transfers product rights, GYBYS declines for two consecutive years