Keeping innovation growing at a fast clip while retaining new global supply chain capacity built up during the pandemic were the main topics of discussion at the Bio Asia-Taiwan conference July 27 in Taipei. With the theme of the conference, “Connecting the Asia Value Chain,” Taiwan Vice President Ching-Te Lai said the pandemic has demonstrated Taiwan’s resilience as well as the strength of the global biopharma industry.

Biopharma deals during the second quarter of 2022 fell short of each of the last two years with 379 completed deals valued at $36.9 billion, but the year is still the strongest to date. Thanks to the record-breaking first quarter, deals in the first half of this year are ahead of all other years, reaching a total value of $93.8 billion, 6.5% more than 2020, the next highest first half.

Nonprofit deals with biopharma companies in 2022 indicate that 92% of the disclosed funds are going toward infectious disease therapies, with COVID-19 accounting for 79% of the total.

Although the death toll in the U.S. is nearing 1 million lives lost, signs continue to suggest that an end is in sight for the COVID-19 pandemic, the most disruptive global health crisis in a century.

For the first time since the early weeks of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, global deaths caused by the disease have fallen to their lowest point, as immunity against the SARS-CoV-2 virus and its variants continues to build. Infections and deaths appear to be decelerating, an optimistic sign that the pandemic may be nearing an end.

Although efforts focused on COVID-19 continue to fade and there are fewer collaborations than in previous years, the biopharma industry has recorded record value from mega-deals in the first quarter (Q1) of 2022, topping all recent years, as executives continue to opt against costly mergers and acquisitions.

While the $118.3 billion raised by biopharma companies in 2021 through public and private transactions is 12% lower than the amount raised the prior year, it still represents an impressive financings record, led primarily by IPOs and venture capital rounds.

The pandemic has forced pharma and biotech to be more agile to better navigate the obstacles and still find success. Supply chain gaps are part of the problem, as are clinical trial delays. Yet the industry has successfully forged ahead in the past year to produce the seven drugs Clarivate believes in the next five years will each earn more than $1 billion annually.

There was no slowing of biopharma innovation in 2021, even as industry directed significant resources to, while feeling the impact of, the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The year saw big wins for developers of DNA vaccines and biosimilars, while CAR T expanded its reach and a drug target once considered undruggable was finally conquered. And as 2021 gives way to 2022, other potentially game-changing technologies and therapeutics are waiting in the wings.