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.

Every year, the BioWorld team takes time to look back and assess the market-moving and life-changing stories and trends of the year. Without a doubt, COVID-19 shook humanity to the core, again. And like glioblastoma, the tentacles of COVID-19 invaded far beyond the obvious and ultimately changed the world. So that’s our top story of the year. But the biopharmaceutical industry is resilient and responsive. Even though there were tectonic shifts in efforts to bring an armamentarium of COVID-19 vaccines and therapeutics to patients with record-breaking speed, work continued on other fronts, because people are still getting sick with cancer, succumbing to horrible diseases like Alzheimer’s and issues such as the battle over drug prices rage on.

In China, 2021 saw a number of regulatory efforts aimed at encouraging companies developing novel drugs. As a result, analysts expect that impact investment and investors would allocate capital to “truly innovative oncology drugs” so 2022 could see a more supportive ecosystem for the development of rare disease treatments in China. Meanwhile, they believe that me-too and me-worse drugs, which have accounted for a large portion of China’s drug market, would have a more difficult time getting marketing approval.

PERTH, Australia – Australia attracted international attention in July when a Federal Court ruled that artificial intelligence can be named as the inventor of a patent. In Thaler v. Commissioner of Patents, Federal Court Justice Jonathan Beach ruled that under Australian patent law, inventors don’t necessarily have to be human. The decision challenges the assumption that only human beings can be inventors. Beach did rule, however, that an AI system cannot apply for a patent or receive a patent.

In 2021, progress on preventing and treating COVID-19 was a seemingly endless series of starts and stalls. In spite of the high-profile stumbles, science and finance took startling steps forward.