Bayer Pharma China Open Innovation Day 2025 Successfully Held, Showcasing Breakthrough Collaborations and Unveiling Winners of Inaugural 'Co-Creating New Medicines' Competition

Today, the 2025 Bayer Prescription Drugs China Open Innovation Day was successfully held at the Bayer Co.Lab co-creation platform. At the event, the final winners of the inaugural Bayer China “Co-Creation · New Drug” Competition were announced. Six biotechnology companies focusing on oncology, cardiovascular and renal diseases, immunology, and new technology platforms were honored for their breakthrough innovations. This not only demonstrates Bayer’s high regard and recognition of China’s innovation and new drug R&D capabilities, but also marks another key step in further upgrading its innovation strategy in China.

Themed “Collaborative Innovation, Healing Together,” the event brought together Bayer’s global and China-based leadership from drug R&D, external collaborations, and intellectual property, alongside industry experts, research institutions, investment firms, and startup partners. Participants engaged in in-depth discussions on key topics such as the development of the biopharmaceutical industry, breakthroughs in cutting-edge technologies, and future collaboration opportunities, demonstrating Bayer’s firm commitment to deeply integrating into China’s pharmaceutical innovation ecosystem and continuously strengthening open innovation and external partnerships.

Li Qi, Vice President of Bayer Pharmaceuticals, Head of the International R&D Center in Beijing, and Head of Regulatory Science and Registration Affairs in China, stated, “Through ‘Bayer Pharmaceuticals China Open Innovation Day,’ we aim to bring together top-tier expertise, integrate global perspectives with local insights, and collaborate with China’s innovative forces to write a new chapter in the future of biopharmaceuticals. Bayer is continuously advancing its innovation and R&D strategies, empowering and accelerating the new drug development process through diverse, open, and flexible external collaborations, striving to realize our vision of ‘Being rooted in China’s development to serve patients worldwide; linking global networks to support innovation in China.’”

In recent years, Bayer has focused on key R&D areas, establishing a highly differentiated research and development pipeline to drive long-term growth in oncology, cardiovascular and renal diseases, neurology and rare diseases, and immunology. In the fields of oncology and cardiovascular and renal diseases, the company continuously integrates its internal R&D capabilities with external collaboration opportunities, focusing on precision medicine and striving to deliver breakthrough therapies for patients. Through rigorous evaluation and prioritization, Bayer’s prescription drug portfolio is now fully concentrated on therapeutic areas with the greatest unmet medical needs and the highest value potential. Meanwhile, Bayer regards China as a core strategic market and important partner for global pharmaceutical innovation, actively exploring diverse external collaborations and gathering multiple sources of innovative momentum to continuously build a synergistic pharmaceutical innovation ecosystem integrating “industry, academia, research, innovation, and investment.”

Bayer launched the “Co-Creation · New Drugs” competition in China for the first time in July 2025, aiming to deeply explore frontier innovative achievements in China’s biotechnology sector, accelerate the innovation process of local startups, and lead the future development of the pharmaceutical industry in China and globally. Six biotechnology companies stood out as the ultimate winners, earning high recognition and unanimous acclaim from Bayer’s global expert jury for their exceptional performance in scientific innovation breakthroughs, clinical medical needs, competitive differentiation advantages, and feasibility proof-of-concept. In the field of oncology: Zhiben Medicine has delved deeply into research on tumor drug resistance mechanisms, seeking breakthroughs through the translation of achievements from top-tier research institutions; Gaowei Medicine has developed unique high-dimensional biological algorithms to extract multi-dimensional information, identifying effective, specific, and druggable targets for complex diseases; Aibeile focuses on next-generation immunotherapy for solid tumors, demonstrating rapid translational capabilities from research to clinical application. In the fields of cardiovascular and renal diseases, and immunology: AlphaMolecule specializes in important GPCR target families, with its AI-driven platform successfully advancing first-in-class products into clinical trials; Shanghai Yinuo Pharmaceutical focuses on autoimmune diseases, chronic inflammation, and metabolic complications, independently developing multiple projects that demonstrate its potential in exploring novel mechanisms. In terms of cutting-edge technology platforms, Yaosu Technology leverages organ-on-a-chip technology combined with high-content 3D cell imaging, computer vision, and artificial intelligence for drug discovery and precision medicine research.

These six winning enterprises will receive multiple awards and exclusive benefits from Bayer, including onboarding bonuses for the Bayer Co.Lab co-creation platform, customized mentoring from Bayer’s senior experts and entrepreneurship mentors, direct access to global online demo days hosted by Bayer Co.Lab, and introductions to partner institutions within the Bayer Co.Lab Global Venture Capital Alliance. These resources are designed to empower these leading biopharmaceutical startups to further accelerate their innovation and development processes, bringing clinically urgent breakthrough therapies and solutions to patients sooner.

Professor Dominik Ruettinger, Senior Vice President of Bayer’s Pharmaceuticals Division and Global Head of Oncology Research and Early Development, stated, “The quality and speed of biopharmaceutical innovation in China are impressive, making it an indispensable force in the global landscape of innovative drug research and development. We closely monitor high-caliber innovations that align with Bayer’s R&D strategy and will actively collaborate with more outstanding Chinese partners in key therapeutic areas to integrate the most groundbreaking local R&D achievements into Bayer’s global pipeline, working together to deliver more transformative therapies to patients worldwide.”

Bayer continues to strengthen synergies through open innovation and external collaborations, accelerating the translation of local Chinese innovations into global clinical development. In March this year, Bayer entered into a global licensing agreement with Puhe Pharma for an oral small-molecule PRMT5 inhibitor that selectively targets MTAP-deficient tumors. The first patient has now been enrolled in the Phase I first-in-human dose-escalation clinical trial, marking a critical step forward in bringing the fruits of this collaborative innovation to ultimately benefit patients.

Furthermore, as a key component and latest initiative of Bayer’s open innovation strategy, its global co-creation platform, Bayer Co.Lab, continues to empower local startups and early-stage innovations by providing access to global resources and networks. Since its launch in September 2024, Bayer Co.Lab in China has successfully attracted multiple high-potential startups, fostering a biomedical innovation cluster that spans various innovative technologies and therapeutic areas. At the inaugural Bayer Pharmaceuticals China Open Innovation Day, Udao Bio, a leading company in the field of AI-enabled allosteric small-molecule drug development, announced its official entry into Bayer Co.Lab. The two parties will explore potential collaborations based on the AI-driven allosteric drug development platform, ALLOSTAR™.

*Latest Tenant at Bayer Co.Lab

Udao Bio is a clinical-stage biotechnology company focused on the discovery and development of allosteric drugs, dedicated to developing small-molecule therapeutics for traditionally “undruggable” targets. We have developed ALLOSTAR™, a proprietary computational platform that leverages artificial intelligence and principles of physics to identify potential allosteric pockets on novel protein targets, evaluate allosteric effects, and perform de novo generation or optimization of small-molecule drugs with allosteric mechanisms. Addressing unmet clinical needs, leveraging the advantages of allosteric small-molecule drugs, and capitalizing on our team’s technical expertise, we have built an allosteric drug development pipeline with best-in-class (BIC) and first-in-class (FIC) potential. This pipeline focuses on oncology, cardiovascular, and metabolic diseases, encompassing molecular mechanisms of both allosteric agonists and inhibitors.

*Company profiles are sourced from the listed companies

2025 Bayer China “Co-Creation · New Drug” Competition Winning Enterprise*

Founded in 2021, Zhiben Pharma was established based on the translation of original scientific and technological achievements from the Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Sciences. The company operates under a unique asset-light VLC (VC + Lab + CRO) model, efficiently integrating capital, research, and industrial resources to accelerate the clinical development of globally leading original scientific innovations. Focusing on the R&D of innovative small-molecule drugs, Zhiben Pharma addresses major unmet clinical needs, such as tumor drug resistance and severe infections. With an end-to-end approach, the company is committed to developing First-in-class or Best-in-class breakthrough therapies, aiming to bring more high-quality original Chinese scientific innovations to benefit patients worldwide.

Gaowei Pharma is dedicated to overcoming the challenges and addressing the hotspots in new drug development, specifically focusing on "undruggable targets" and diseases with unclear mechanisms. The company is committed to accumulating high-dimensional, high-quality biological data. Through its proprietary target discovery platform, Gaowei has successfully identified novel targets with new mechanisms of action and efficiently advanced them to the preclinical candidate compound stage. The company boasts a pipeline of more than ten assets, with its core candidate, GW-01, expected to submit Investigational New Drug (IND) applications in both China and the United States within the year. Gaowei has completed two rounds of financing, raising nearly RMB 100 million in total.

Aibele is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company headquartered in Hong Kong, China, with operations in China, the United States, Australia, and Singapore. The company is dedicated to developing innovative immunotherapies to improve treatment outcomes for patients with advanced solid tumors. Focusing on the CDH17 target, Aibele has established a pipeline encompassing multispecific antibodies, antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs), and cell therapies. Its core asset, ARB202, a CDH17-targeted T-cell engager, has completed Phase I studies and is entering the dose expansion phase. The company is simultaneously advancing the development of CDH17 companion diagnostics to enable precision medicine. Leveraging an international team and a collaborative network spanning industry, academia, and research, Aibele is committed to delivering transformative therapeutic solutions for patients.

AlphaMol is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company dedicated to the development of novel therapeutics targeting G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs). The company has established a comprehensive AI-driven drug discovery platform for GPCRs. In the 2021 Global GPCR-DOCK Competition, AlphaMol outperformed Google’s AlphaFold 2 with a 60% higher accuracy. In 2022, both partners of AlphaMol were listed among the “World’s Top 2% Scientists.” The company’s first-in-class candidate targeting the orphan receptor MRGPRX2 has officially entered clinical trials.

Shanghai Yinuo Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. is a clinical-stage novel drug development company led by a team of senior pharmaceutical experts, dedicated to the research and development of innovative therapies for major complex diseases such as autoimmune disorders, chronic inflammation, and metabolic complications. By integrating systems biology and deep learning-based artificial intelligence technologies, the company guides the entire drug discovery and development process, has established an integrated platform for innovative drug R&D, and built a competitively international pipeline of novel therapeutics. Currently, multiple independently developed projects are underway, including a first-in-class oral medication for diabetic eye disease, which is in Phase II clinical trials and gradually demonstrating therapeutic potential.

Founded in Boston, USA, at the end of 2021, Yaosu Technology is the world’s first “3D-Wet-AI” biotech startup leveraging organ-on-a-chip technology combined with high-content 3D cell imaging, computer vision, and artificial intelligence for drug discovery and precision medicine research. The founding team members primarily hail from renowned multinational pharmaceutical companies and top-tier research institutions, bringing extensive experience in industrial pharmaceutical product development and cutting-edge R&D in biology and AI technologies. As an organ-on-a-chip company, Yaosu is collaborating with the FDA and multinational pharmaceutical enterprises to jointly develop and establish next-generation preclinical efficacy testing standards based on organ-on-a-chip technology.

*Company introductions are sourced from the winning enterprises