Sinopharm Invests RMB 1.2 Billion to Acquire Small Nucleic Acid Biotech Hejiya, Gaining Key Assets Including a Muscle-Sparing Weight-Loss Pipeline

Following the $500 million acquisition of innovative pharmaceutical company SANEGENEBIO in 2025, Chinese pharmaceutical giant Sino Biopharmaceutical Co., Ltd. has officially announced another acquisition deal worth 1.2 billion yuan.

On the evening of January 13, Sino Biopharm (1177.HK), a leading pharmaceutical company in Hong Kong's stock market, announced that it would acquire all shares of SANEGENEBIO, an innovative small nucleic acid drug company, for a total price of RMB 1.2 billion. Sino Biopharm stated that this is the first significant acquisition in China's small nucleic acid field initiated by a large pharmaceutical enterprise.

According to a research report by SDIC Securities, small nucleic acid drugs mainly include small interfering RNA (siRNA), antisense oligonucleotides (ASO), and aptamers (Aptamer). According to the PharmaCube database, as of December 3, 2025, there are 23 small nucleic acid drugs on the global market, seven of which are siRNA drugs.

Globally, the most representative siRNA drug is Novartis' Inclisiran sodium injection, a long-acting siRNA therapy targeting PCSK9 that can lower low-density lipoprotein cholesterol with just two injections per year. In the first half of 2025, the drug generated $555 million in revenue for Novartis, marking a 66% year-over-year increase.

This acquisition is not Sino Biopharm's first foray into the small nucleic acid field. In December 2025, SANEGENEBIO announced the completion of a Series B financing round exceeding US$110 million, with Sino Biopharm being one of the investors. Leveraging its proprietary RNAi drug discovery platform, SANEGENEBIO has built a diversified pipeline covering different therapeutic areas such as autoimmune diseases, cardiovascular diseases, metabolic disorders, and obesity, with multiple candidates already in clinical stages.

Hegia Biotech, founded in 2018, owns six intrahepatic/extrahepatic delivery platforms, with four innovative drugs entering clinical stages, over 20 projects in preclinical stages, and has achieved two out-licensing deals. Among them, the MVIP intrahepatic delivery platform is the world’s first and only siRNA platform validated by clinical data that enables “once-a-year” dosing.

Specific to the product pipeline, Kylo-11, targeting the LPA gene, has completed the first patient dosing in the China-U.S. international multicenter Phase II clinical trial in October 2025. It is the fastest-progressing small nucleic acid product in China for treating hyperlipoproteinemia (a). This is the world’s first small nucleic acid product with clinical trial results enabling a "once-a-year" dosing regimen. If successful, it is also expected to upgrade the current "twice-a-year" dosing frequency of lipid-lowering injections to "once-a-year."

Besides Kylo-11, another pipeline worth noting from Hegia is Kylo-0603 in the weight-loss sector. According to an announcement by Sino Biopharm, this is the world's first small-molecule THR-β agonist that achieves specific liver targeting through GalNAc conjugation. It is expected to deliver better efficacy and safety with a smaller dosage, providing a new oral option for fat reduction while preserving muscle and treating metabolic-associated fatty liver disease. Its Phase II clinical trial is expected to commence in the first half of 2026. In the field of weight management and metabolism, Sino Biopharm has already laid out products related to Activin R2 and Amylin. The newly acquired pipeline through this acquisition is expected to further strengthen its position in the weight management sector.

In recent years, there have been frequent BD transactions in the global small nucleic acid field. For instance, Ribo Biotech, a small nucleic acid company in China, reached a BD deal with the well-known multinational pharmaceutical company Boehringer Ingelheim (BI) in January 2024, with a potential total transaction value exceeding $2 billion. Public data also shows that the average single transaction amount for global small nucleic acid BD deals in 2024 surpassed $800 million. Sino Biopharmaceutical Co., Ltd. also mentioned in its announcement that the total disclosed global transaction value in the siRNA field would exceed $35 billion in 2025, with a year-on-year growth rate of over 40%.

In June 2025, Sino Biopharm publicly stated that out-licensing transactions have become one of the company's key strategic goals, with multiple assets currently holding out-licensing potential. The high-quality assets injected into Sino Biopharm through this acquisition are also expected to become new leverage for its future out-licensing business development (BD).

Pengpai News reporter Xiaoxiao Li