Simcere Pharmaceutical Group, the biggest mainland pharmaceutical company listed in the United States, plans to launch one new made-in-China drug every year as a way to enhance the company's position in the highly fragmented domestic market.

Company chairman Ren Jinsheng said only self-developed drugs could make the mainland's pharmaceutical industry stronger.

"Simcere aims to be the pioneer of self-invented drugs in the Chinese market. All we need is time," Mr Ren said.

Simcere, which is 21 per cent owned by an investment arm formed under Legend Holdings, Goldman Sachs, DBS and Singapore's Temasek Holdings, raised US$260 million in April last year on the New York Stock Exchange by issuing 15.6 million shares. Of the proceeds, 400 million yuan will be used for research and development.

Mr Ren started his business by wholesaling licensed drugs in the mainland in 1994 with just 50,000 yuan. After 13 years, Simcere has grown to a medium-sized company with 2,000 staff.
After listing on the New York Stock Exchange, its market capitalisation has reached US$860 million.

"Of the total staff, 120 of them are working on research and development," he said. "We're inventing 12 items now and one is going to be launched this year. Another one is coming out by next year."

The company is also on the lookout for acquisitions to realise its "drug powerhouse" dream. "We'll acquire small drug firms which are unable to go into big-scale commercialisation," Mr Ren said.

"The US drug market is worth US$300 billion, while the Chinese market is worth 300 billion yuan. I'm sure in 12 to 15 years, China can catch up with the US drug market," the chairman said.

Total sales of drugs in the mainland reached 156.81 billion yuan in the first quarter, an increase of 7.34 per cent from a year earlier.

Mr Ren said the recent restructuring of the State Food and Drug Administration showed the government's determination to combat fake drugs. "This is a move to revive consumer confidence as the Chinese drug market is transforming. It talked about quantity before, but now we need quality," he said.

The administration announced last week it would spend US$1.1 billion to build new safety testing laboratories to upgrade food safety inspection offices. The announcement was made amid a series of global scares leading to the perception that the mainland was not doing enough to guarantee the safety of exported foods and drugs.

Simcere posted total revenue of 355 million yuan for the second quarter, an increase of 51.3 per cent, and net profit of 83.1 million yuan, a 67.4 per cent surge year on year, on strong growth of its patented drugs Bicun and Endostar, used to treat stroke and cancer patients respectively.