New Initiative Set to Boost UK SMEs Engagement with China’s Healthcare Market

In a Sep. 9, 2019 press release, it was revealed that the BioIndustry Association (BIA) has signed a memorandum of understanding with AstraZeneca and the Wuxi International Life-science Innovation Campus (I-Campus) in China.

Through this initiative it is hoped that small-to-medium enterprises (SMEs) from the United Kingdom (UK) will be afforded easier access to the Chinese healthcare market. Additionally, the I-Campus will serve as the Chinese headquarters for AstraZeneca.

“This is a key initiative for the BIA to make it easier for UK life-sciences SMEs to do business in China,” said Steve Bates OBE, chief executive of the BIA in the press release. “The opening of the Wuxi I-campus will do much to de-risk and de-mystify China for UK companies. Wuxi is a city renowned for manufacturing and being at the center of the ‘Internet of things’ in China. The I-Campus will build on Wuxi’s innovation heritage and be a significant landing pad for UK biotech companies looking to expand and collaborate in China.”

“The I-Campus will be a global collaboration hub within a country that has been at the frontier of innovation for the past millennia,” added Dr. Jane Osbourn OBE, chair of the BIA and VP for Research and Development at AstraZeneca. “We have much to learn from Chinese innovation-and hope to be able to partner and harness it for our own challenges of unmet medical need, and improving the affordability of healthcare for our society.”

Source: BIA