SHANGHAI – The anti-corruption storm last summer that engulfed much of the biopharmaceutical industry here – with Glaxosmithkline plc at the center – was a game changer for China, primarily due to the amount of information released about the case from the very the beginning, contrary to what one would expect from the usually opaque Chinese government.
SHANGHAI – The U.S. Pharmacopeial Convention (USP), a non-profit medicines standard setting body, has expanded its Shanghai laboratories with plans to increase biologics capacity in the near future.
SHANGHAI – Bayer AG has signed a three-year partnership with Peking University (known locally as Beida) to establish the Bayer Healthcare/Peking University Center of Translational Research for Drug Discovery (BPC/TRDD).
SHANGHAI – Mezzion Pharma Co. Ltd., of Seoul, South Korea, has signed an agreement with New England Research Institutes Inc. (NERI) to conduct government-sponsored clinical trials for udenafil. A long-acting phosphodiesterase type 5 (PDE5) inhibitor first approved in Korea and Russia for erectile dysfunction, udenafil will be trialed as a treatment for adolescents who face shortened lifespans due to reduced heart function due to congenital heart defects.
SHANGHAI – The Chinese-American joint venture Kunshan Riboquark Pharmaceutical Technology Co. Ltd. has raised ¥42 million (US$7 million) in venture capital financing to develop QPI-1007, an ocular neuroprotectant that uses small interfering RNA technology (siRNA) to stop the progression of glaucoma.
SHANGHAI – China has issued two legal announcements in its bid to root out corruption in the pharmaceutical industry. They focus on both the demand and supply side of corruption in China, targeting pharma companies that pay bribes and the doctors who accept them.
SHANGHAI – Shenzhen Hepalink Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. announced a stock purchase agreement to fully acquire Scientific Protein Laboratories LLC (SPL), of Waunakee, Wis.
SHANGHAI – Simcere Pharmaceutical Group has completed a management buyout first announced in March and subsequent delisting from the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE:SCR). Going private will protect the company from revealing information publicly during a sensitive time as Chinese biopharmas have been rocked by bribery scandals for the past six months.
