3^rd March, 2024, Xiamen

Night 2^nd March, Xiamen. The First Seminar on Tuberculosis International Public Health Market Development by China’s Innovative Diagnostic Companies was successfully held. This seminar was a collaboration between the Innovation Alliance (IATB) and Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) with the latter providing technical assistance and philanthropical donations. The aim of the seminar was to unriddle some of the dilemmas and confusions as well as challenges encountered commonly when a growing number of China’s innovative TB developers and companies are setting their eyes and competing in the global public health market.

In opening, Prof. Liang Li, chairman of the IATB, deputy director of Beijing Chest Hospital pointed out that we are eleven years away from 2035, but currently all key attributes of TB prevention and control are falling behind the milestones set, most acutely an ever-growing gap of TB case detection, about 3 million missing cases around world. To address these challenges, technological breakthroughs in multiple areas are needed. In recent years, many China’s IVDs developers and companies have made great stride in rapid TB molecular diagnostics, TB POCTs as well as computer aided detection for TB (CAD4TB), a number of them have demonstrated comparable performance with mainstream international rivals with a better cost-effectiveness. However, exposure of these products on the international theme has been limited to date. Reasons behind this under-exposure are varied, many Chinese companies are not aware of the existence of international public health market let alone strategies and knowhow of competing in such a market, most of China’s IVD products have not been internationally validated and approved, very few of them have acquired the WHO pre-qualification and of course the potential of making a return from competing in this sector has been another major concern. By hosting this seminar, we are trying to discuss some of the issues mentioned above and hopefully can make the picture a bit clearer for our partners who are interested in oversea market development.

Innovation Alliance has invited four speakers to cover issues that may profoundly impact the odds of success once a company is decided to compete in the international public health market, namely regulatory approvals, landscape and size of the market, possible channels of out bounding trade and experience sharing by pioneers. Dr. Yi Tang of the WHO China office spoke about the process and significance of acquiring a WHO Pre-qualification. He stressed that while WHO PQ is recognized by many third world countries, it can not be seem as the silver bullet, regulatory approval should still be regarded as a country specific matter, acquiring Stringent Regulatory Agency (SRA) approvals is still the most desirable. Dr. Claire Watkins of Clinton Health Initiative (CHAI) introduced in detail the current landscape of TB products on the international public health market. She pointed out that while therapeutics and vaccines are all of a higher bar in terms of clinical validation, market approval and competitiveness of rival companies, TB diagnostics is currently a low hanging fruit when it comes to urgency of demands and stringent regulation, especially for those technologies with potential for uptake in high-burden resource constraint settings. Representing the national flagship of out bounding medical trade, Dr. Yingtao Liu of Sinopharm, shared with the audience major channels of out bounding medical trade as well as Sinopharm’s experiences in utilizing these different channels. He stressed that global demand for quality cost-effective Chinese medical products is substantial, it is a market worth exploring. Lastly, Mrs. Zhen Liang of Ustar bio introduced their experiences in international collaboration and market exploration. She pointed out that research collaboration with major international health organizations is pivotal in terms of building up high quality evidence base and global exposure. After the former presentation, Dr. Shitong Huan technical office of the BMGF, and Prof. Yuhong Liu of Beijing Chest Hospital, joined all the speakers participated in a short discussion and Q&A where issues relating to and beyond the talks were exchanged thoroughly.

The seminar has been an instant success with many positive feedbacks received from our speakers, audience and especially our industrial partners who are interested in overseas market development. All believe that such event should carry on into the future.

Report by Zi Chen, Innovation Alliance

Photo by Cong Lin, Beijing Chest Hospital