Shandong’s draft "15th Five-Year" pharmaceutical industry development action
plan, published for consultation, aims to cultivate more than 10
provincial-level flagship industry-chain leader firms and build an ecosystem led
by innovative drug champions with complementary niche strengths. The draft
encourages these chain-leader firms to expand through mergers & acquisitions and
strategic cooperation to achieve scale and integration, strengthening ecosystem
leadership and core competitiveness. It directs lead firms to leverage
technology, capital, brand and market advantages to form innovation consortia,
compile a catalogue of key common technologies, and coordinate
upstream‑downstream joint R&D. Lead firms are also urged to open supply‑chain
and innovation‑chain resources to integrate smaller suppliers, promoting a
development pattern of lead-firm guidance, chain-wide coordination and cluster
advancement to consolidate the sector’s scale advantage.
