»PROCESS« China

For the pharmaceutical industry, 2024 is a year full of opportunities and challenges, innovation and change. Against the background of optimized policy environment, rising quantity and quality of domestic innovative drugs, stable growth of the generic drug market, strengthened international cooperation, and equal emphasis on talent cultivation and introduction, the pharmaceutical industry will continue to innovate and change, and provide more high-quality and efficient drugs and services for patients.

According to the National Bureau of Statistics, from January to September 2024, enterprises above designated size in the pharmaceutical manufacturing industry realized operating revenues of RMB 1844.7 billion, an increase of 0.2% year-on-year, especially in September when the pharmaceutical manufacturing industry grew by 11.0% year-on-year, showing growth potential. Among them, in the first three quarters, the production of crude chemical drugs reached 2.584 million tons, with a cumulative growth of 7.5%, maintaining a faster growth rate in production. In the nuclear medicine industry pipeline layout, the domestic nuclear medicine enterprises have 75 pipeline in the research, involving nearly 20 pharmaceutical companies, domestic and overseas development have shown a trend of “diagnosis and treatment integration”. In addition, more and more pharmaceutical companies are actively exploring overseas markets, some companies' overseas business has become an important driving force for growth.

In the context of rapid development of the pharmaceutical industry, accelerated research and development of innovative drugs, the vitality of niche areas, increasingly fierce competition in the market, as well as the growing concern for sustainable development and green energy saving, the 16th Vogel Pharmaceutical Engineering International Forum came to Wuxi for the first time from October 24th to 25th, presenting a high-specification, highly professional knowledge feast for the attending audience.

Enlighten the new quality productivity of medicine and lead the new course of industrial innovation and development

At the main forum, Zhou Baodong, Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee of Scientech Information and Publications, attended and delivered a speech. He said that the pharmaceutical industry is an important industry related to national economy and people's livelihood, and also an important guarantee for promoting a healthy China. In the new stage of development, China has put forward higher requirements for the pharmaceutical industry, emphasizing the improvement of the pharmaceutical industry and medical equipment industry toughness and modernization level, enhance the supply capacity of high-end drugs, key technologies and raw materials, give full play to the unique advantages of Traditional Chinese Medicine, and promote the iterative upgrading of domestically produced medical equipment as the focus of the development.

To achieve these goals, it is necessary to start from increasing investment in R&D, optimizing industrial layout, promoting the deep integration of industry, academia, research and application, improving the quality of medicines, giving full play to the unique advantages of Traditional Chinese Medicine, as well as promoting the green and low-carbon transformation, etc., and gradually promote the high-quality development of the pharmaceutical industry action plan to take root, and to realize the sustainable and healthy development of the pharmaceutical industry.

Since 2009, the Vogel Pharmaceutical Engineering International Forum has been held in China for the 16th time. There are many enterprises and experts accompanying the forum, including one of the founders of the forum, Sun Xiaobing, Chief Engineer of Tasly Holding Group Co. Along the way, the forum has always insisted on playing the role of a bridge, and is committed to becoming an interactive platform for domestic and foreign experts, enterprises and research institutions to carry out technical exchanges, experience sharing, project cooperation and talent docking.

This year, the forum established cooperation with Jiangsu Pharmaceutical Association, Wuxi Biomedical Industry Association and other organizations, and for the first time into Wuxi for the audience to present a high-profile, highly professional knowledge feast. As Xu Chongyuan, the chief expert of Wuxi Biomedical Industry Association, said, in the current situation where many challenges exist, it is the right time for Vogel Pharmaceutical Engineering International Forum to lead the national industry to explore the new trends and opportunities in the pharmaceutical industry. She believes that in the future, driven by the innovative technology led by artificial intelligence, the pharmaceutical industry standards, business models, pharmaceutical industry regulation, product quality competition will usher in new disruptive changes and even industrial restructuring. The industry will say goodbye to the low-threshold, small and scattered, more and weaker stage, stepping into a new period of high-quality development and innovation to gather advantages.

The Forum has been successfully held for 16 consecutive years and has become an important platform for promoting the high-quality development of the pharmaceutical industry, which is inseparable from the insistence on the quality of content. In the process of planning and organizing each forum, we will actively explore and track the hot topics of the industry and absorb the excellent resources of the industry. This forum lasted for 2 days, including 1 main forum and 8 sub-forums, inviting nearly 60 speakers to share their innovative ideas, technical trends and advanced cases on the latest policies and regulations, R&D, manufacturing and quality management of the global pharmaceutical industry.

At the main forum, speakers shared in-depth information on hot concepts such as new quality productivity, computational medicine and continuous manufacturing, which aroused enthusiastic responses from participants. Zhang Ziran, invited vice president of China Pharmaceutical Industry Association, believes that under the background of national whole-chain support for innovative drugs, the degree of smart, green and standardization in the field of drug production will continue to increase. Zhao Yu, a professor of Western Institute of Computing Technology, pointed out that computational medicine is the next flag of innovation, which can reduce experimental trial-and-error and improve the efficiency of research and development through analog simulation. This technology is expected to dramatically compress the cycle and cost of drug R&D, constantly output original innovations to the industry, and release the production capacity of all links in the industry chain. Globally, computational medicine is becoming a new trend, and China needs to seize the opportunity to promote computational medicine as a new pedestal technology for the pharmaceutical industry and as an industrial engine.

Deeply plowing niche fields and building a diversified ecosystem for innovation and development of pharmaceutical industry together

In the sub-forum, nearly 50 excellent experts and enterprise representatives delivered speeches, analyzing the current difficulties and bottlenecks in the pharmaceutical industry from a professional and practical point of view, shared the latest progress and practical experience, and provided valuable guidance and inspiration for the innovation breakthroughs and industrial upgrading of the pharmaceutical industry as a whole. The forum was composed of 8 themes of aseptic processing, biopharmaceutical process and engineering, advanced manufacturing of solid dosage forms, smart factory and energy-saving and carbon-reducing, biopharmaceutical production and quality control, pharmaceutical facilities and equipment management, pharmaceutical water technology, and seminar of pharmaceutical shared facilities manufacturing compliance.

In addition to the keynote speeches, the forum also held the “Process Industry” pharmaceutical process and equipment special issue of the outstanding authors award activities, aimed at further stimulating the enthusiasm of the majority of authors engaged in pharmaceutical research and application, write more in-depth and valuable articles, share more innovative results and excellent cases. During the forum, more than 20 enterprises and organizations set up exhibitions on site to display the latest technology and information of industry development. In addition, the forum also organized enterprise visits and exchanges, and more than 50 delegates went to WuXi XDC and AstraZeneca China Health Internet of Things Innovation Center for visits and learning.

After the meeting, many participants said that the high quality of the content and the well-organized forum not only provided them with an opportunity to understand the latest trends and innovative technologies in the industry, but also brought them valuable opportunities for cooperation. In the future, Vogel Pharmaceutical Engineering International Forum will continue to uphold the characteristics of international, professional, advanced and high-end, and actively play the role of a platform for “promoting exchanges” and “promoting transformations”, in order to lead the innovation, support the growth of outstanding industry professionals, promote international technology exchange, accelerate the integration of technology and practice, and promote the development of the industry.