R&D Approach // Chi-Med
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R&D Approach

Our chemistry-led strategy focuses on the development of kinase inhibitors with:

  • Unique selectivity to limit target-based toxicity
  • High potency to optimise the dose selection with the objective to lower the required dose and thereby limit compound-based toxicity
  • Chemical structures deliberately engineered to improve drug exposure in the targeted tissue
  • The ability to be combined with other therapeutic agents

This approach consists of two main pillars:

  1. Developing synthetic compounds against novel targets with global first-in-class potential, which includes savolitinib (targeting c-Met), HMPL-523 (targeting Syk) and HMPL-453 (targeting FGFR1/2/3); and
  2. Developing synthetic compounds against validated targets with clear differentiation to potentially be a global best-in-class/next generation therapy in their respective categories, including fruquintinib (targeting VEGFR1/2/3), sulfatinib (targeting VEGFR/FGFR1/CSF-1R), epitinib (targeting EGFRm+ brain metastasis), theliatinib (targeting EGFR wild type) and HMPL-689 (targeting PI3K).

We have built our Innovation Platform into a productive global oncology and immunology drug research and development operation based in China. Our experienced research and development management team have all worked at multi-national pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies and have participated in the discovery and development of global blockbuster drugs, including Humira™, Sutent™, Zithromax™, Revlimid™, Zometa™ and Incivek™. Together, they have systematically built a productive research and development team, which we believe is one of the largest in the oncology and immunology biotechnology space.

This represents a fully-integrated drug discovery and development organization covering chemistry, biology, pharmacology, toxicology, chemistry and manufacturing controls, clinical and regulatory and other functions, all of which work seamlessly together. We have a proven track record in internal discovery, with all our differentiated drug candidates having advanced into the clinic in the past 10 years.