Case Study: Insights into Research and Development in China
As the world’s second-largest healthcare market, China offers drug developers the opportunity to tap into a large, concentrated patient base, lower costs of manufacturing and a potentially less stringent regulatory landscape. Listen to Brass Tacks Analyst Aurora Chen share an example of how we recently guided one biopharma client in developing their competitive readiness strategy in China.
Transcript:
Hi, I’m Aurora Chen. I earned my MBA and MPH from Washington University in St. Louis and I’m now an analyst at Brass Tacks Health.
Brass Tacks Health is a boutique consultancy that guides biotech and pharma teams in identifying the most meaningful, pragmatic, and equitable approach to clinical development, using perspectives that reflect the diversity of the patient populations being served.
One of our core strengths is providing our clients with clarity of vision across the clinical development landscape in China. As the world’s second-largest healthcare market, developing a competitive advantage in China can mean access to a large, concentrated patient base, lower cost of manufacturing and a potentially less stringent regulatory landscape.
I want to share one example of how we recently guided a client to tap into these opportunities.
First, we developed insights into the commercial objectives of this client’s key competitors in China. We developed these using company press releases, Chinese clinical trial databases, Chinese versions of company websites and WeChat accounts.
Next, we elucidated each of their competitors’ strategies to reaching these objectives, such as whether company’s were relying on their in-house teams or if they were outsourcing execution through partnerships with local organizations.
From here, we used our primary intel network in China to gain insights into competitor positioning and key areas of differentiation. For example: product attributes, pricing, discounting and market access in rural versus urban settings.
At the same time, we gained insights into patient segmentation and clinical workflow barriers to implementation at the customer level.
Finally, using a combination of primary intel and Chinese databases such as Yaogh, we developed context and insights into pricing strategies and policy trends. This included a detailed view of the payer environment and differences in OTC strategies by city tiers.
As part of this engagement, we attended the annual conference of the Chinese Society of Clinical Oncology (CSCO) to pressure test our takeaways and gain a deeper understanding of discounting strategies by region and market segmentation by hospital class.
The result?
Our client gained visibility into their addressable market in China and the specific strengths and weaknesses of their competitors there. Because we were able to articulate detailed examples their competitors’ interactions with the NMPA, with customers and with the annual reimbursement negotiations for the catalog of medicines covered by local insurance, our client was able to learn from other’s mistakes and build their own strategy based on best practices. With these insights we created a unique value proposition and roadmap for our client to build goodwill and increase their revenue by paving their way into this fast-growing market.