在中國生物科技業打拼的海歸
When Samantha Du returned to her native China in 2001 with a mission to build a pharmaceuticals company, the move seemed like a terrible mistake.
當2001年杜瑩(Samantha Du)帶着創建一家制藥公司的使命回到祖國時，她的舉動似乎像是一個可怕的錯誤。
She had left behind a comfortable life in the US where she spent the previous 12 years, first as an academic scientist and later in roles of rising seniority at Pfizer. Back in China, she felt like an alien in her own country as she tried to start her venture.
她放棄了在美國的優渥生活。她在那裏已經生活了12年，先是讀博士，後來在輝瑞(Pfizer)工作，期間不斷獲得晉升。回到中國，當她設法自己創業時，她反倒感覺自己像一個外國人。
The nadir came during a business meeting in which the refreshments came in the form of hard liquor. She recalls: “Everyone drank until they fell asleep. Then they woke up and signed the contract. While they were sleeping I left the room and cried. I had left a great career and a big house in rural Connecticut. Now here I was negotiating with drunk people.”
最糟糕的時刻是在一次商務會談期間——提神飲品只有烈性酒。她回憶道：“每個人都喝到睡着。醒來之後，他們就把合同簽了。在他們睡着時，我走出房間哭了一場。我捨棄了一份很有前途的事業，還有恬靜的康涅狄格州的大房子。現在，我卻在和一羣醉漢談判。”
Several times she came close to quitting but was dissuaded by business partners. Fifteen years later, her persistence appears to be working. As, first, chief scientific officer of Hutchison China MediTech and now chief executive of Zai Lab, she is prominent among a wave of biotech entrepreneurs aiming to modernise China’s pharma industry and make the country a force in drug development.
好幾次她都差點放棄，但是被合夥人勸止住。15年後，她的堅持似乎正在帶來回報。她先是擔任和黃中國醫藥科技(Hutchison China MediTech)首席科技官，現在任生物科技公司再鼎醫藥(Zai Lab)首席執行官。在一批有志於推動中國醫藥產業現代化並使中國在藥物開發領域嶄露頭角的生物技術創業者中，她是突出的一員。
Most of them are “sea turtles” — the name given to Chinese professionals trained in the west who have returned home armed with qualifications and experience. All nine of Zai Lab’s top management studied at US universities. They have been drawn home by rapidly improving opportunities in China’s life science sector as Beijing pumps resources into its quest for a more innovative, high-value economy.
他們大都是“海龜（歸）”——在西方深造過，帶着文憑和經驗回國的專業人才。再鼎醫藥的9名高管全都曾在美國大學裏深造過。隨着北京方面投入大量資源、尋求將中國經濟打造得更具創新性和高附加值，中國生命科學領域的機遇快速增多，將他們吸引回國。
After a PhD in biochemistry at the University of Cincinnati, Ms Du joined Pfizer as a research scientist and ended up in charge of licensing some of the US group’s drugs around the world. She had not thought about leaving until a call came from Hutchison Whampoa, the holding company of Hong Kong tycoon Li Ka-shing, inviting her to head a new pharma enterprise. “They said, ‘You have already achieved so much in the US. Why not come back and do something for China?’”
在美國辛辛那提大學(University of Cincinnati)獲得生物化學博士學位後，杜瑩加入了輝瑞擔任研究科學家，最終做到主管該公司部分藥物在全球的授權工作。她從未想過離開輝瑞，直至接到來自和記黃埔(Hutchison Whampoa)——香港大亨李嘉誠(Li Ka-shing)的控股公司——的一個電話，邀請她掌舵一家新的製藥公司。“他們說，‘你在美國已經取得這麼多成績。爲什麼不回來爲中國做些事呢’？”
With the resources of one of Asia’s richest men behind her, she criss-crossed China looking for assets to build a company around. It did not prove an easy task. Instead of hidden scientific gems, Ms Du found a domestic industry more interested in eking out margins from cheap generic drugs than investing in research and development. “The mindset was all about trading rather than innovation,” she recalls.
在這位亞洲富豪的雄厚資源支持下，她遍訪中國各地，尋找成立一家公司所需的各種資產。事實證明，這並非一項簡單的工作。杜瑩發現，相較於投資研發、發現隱藏的科學寶藏，國內醫藥產業對於從廉價仿製藥中賺取利潤更感興趣。“大家在想的都是如何進行交易，而非創新，”她回憶道。
Gradually, however, China MediTech, or Chi-Med, began building its own R&D capabilities in partnership with western drugmakers including Eli Lilly and AstraZeneca. The company floated on London’s Aim stock market in 2006 and is planning a dual listing on Nasdaq this month as it pushes two cancer drugs through late-stage trials, with five other products in earlier studies.
然而，逐漸地，和黃醫藥開始與禮來(Eli Lilly)和阿斯利康(AstraZeneca)等西方製藥商合作，建立自主研發能力。2006年，該公司在倫敦證交所的第二板交易市場(AIM)上市，並計劃本月在納斯達克(Nasdaq)完成第二上市。該公司有兩種抗癌藥物正在進行後期臨牀試驗，另外還有5種產品處於早期研究階段。
Ms Du left Chi-Med in 2011 to take charge of Chinese healthcare investments for Sequoia Capital, the Silicon Valley venture capital firm, before founding Zai Lab in 2013. The company has licensed experimental treatments from big pharma partners including Sanofi and Bristol-Myers Squibb, but Ms Du’s long-term focus is on developing homegrown drugs. Zai in January raised $100m in private finance from Sequoia and other big international investors and recently opened an R&D base in Shanghai. “We want to be the first Chinese biotech company with global standing,” says Ms Du.
杜瑩於2011年離開和黃醫藥，之後加入硅谷風險投資公司紅杉資本(Sequoia Capital)，負責在華醫療投資業務，在2013年創立再鼎醫藥。再鼎醫藥從賽諾菲(Sanofi)和百時美施貴寶(Bristol-Myers Squibb)等大型製藥商夥伴那裏，獲得了一些處於臨牀試驗階段的藥物的授權，但杜瑩的長期目標在於研發本土藥物。今年1月，再鼎醫藥從紅杉資本及其他大型國際投資機構處籌集了1億美元，並於近期在上海設立了研發基地。“我們希望成爲中國首家享譽全球的生物技術公司，”杜瑩說。
She is hardly alone in that ambition. BeiGene, a company founded by Xiaodong Wang, former professor of biomedical science at the University of Texas, last month raised $158m on Nasdaq to accelerate development of four promising cancer drugs.
擁有此等雄心的人不止她一個。前德克薩斯大學(University of Texas)生物醫學教授王曉東創辦了生物科技公司百濟神州(BeiGene)，該公司上月在納斯達克籌得1.58億美元，用於加快4種很有前景的抗癌藥物的研發。
Perhaps the most successful “sea turtle” in China’s life science sector is Ge Li, who earned his doctorate at Columbia University and became a biotech entrepreneur in the US before returning home to found WuXi AppTec 15 years ago. The company has since become the biggest Chinese contract research organisation, performing R&D and manufacturing for many of the world’s biggest pharma groups.
中國生命科學領域最成功的“海龜”，或許要數在哥倫比亞大學(Columbia University)獲得博士學位的李革。他在美國時已是一名生物技術創業者，15年前回國創辦了無錫藥明康德(WuXi AppTec)。該公司如今已成爲中國最大的研發外包機構，爲許多世界頂級醫藥集團提供研發和生產服務。
About 5 per cent of WuXi AppTec’s 10,000-strong workforce was trained overseas.
在藥明康德的1萬多名員工中，約5%曾在海外深造。
Among them is Hongye Sun, who studied at Harvard and spent a decade with a Californian biotech company before being lured back to run WuXi’s genomic sequencing business. Mr Sun says the biggest difference with the US is the speed of decision making.
孫洪業就是其中之一。他曾就讀於哈佛大學(Harvard)，在加州一家生物科技公司工作過10年，後來被吸引回國，負責藥明康德的基因組測序業務。孫洪業說，這裏與美國最大不同在於決策的速度。
“In America it felt like I needed 60 meetings to get something done, whereas here I need four.”
“在美國感覺需要開60次會議才能搞定的事，在這裏只需要開4次會。”
WuXi AppTec has tried to harness the vigour of Chinese business culture while importing the quality standards learnt by its top scientists in the west. “We have 15 minutes of compliance training every morning,” says Mr Sun. “We tell our people, ‘We cannot afford a single mistake because if something goes wrong it could ruin the company in a day’”.
藥明康德試圖在利用中國商業文化活力的同時，引入公司頂級科學家在西方學到的質量標準。“我們每天上午要進行15分鐘的合規培訓，”孫洪業說，“我們告訴員工，‘我們一丁點兒錯誤都無法承受，因爲如果出現錯誤，就可能讓公司毀於一旦’。”
While returnees are leading the development of China’s biotech sector, they are increasingly drawing from an expanding local talent pool to build their businesses. China overtook the US in 2008 as the world’s biggest producer of PhDs, and the number has continued to grow rapidly.
雖然海歸們引領着中國生物技術行業的發展，但他們正日益從不斷擴大的本土人才庫中發掘人才，來發展自己的業務。2008年，中國超過美國成爲世界培養博士最多的國家，而中國博士的數量還在繼續快速增長。
Critics question whether the increasing volume is matched by quality. Mr Sun says standards at the top Chinese universities are high, with fierce competition for entry. But he concedes that locally trained scientists can be too deferential.
批評人士質疑，在數量增加的同時，中國博士的素質是否跟得上。孫洪業說，中國頂尖高校的標準很高，入學競爭非常激烈。但他也承認，中國本土培養的科學家過於恭順。
“I tell employees to argue with me and call me by my name, not my title. I tell them, ‘If you use my title, you are less likely to tell me the truth’.”
“我告訴員工可以跟我爭論，直呼我的名字，而不是我的頭銜。我告訴他們，‘如果你們叫我的頭銜，就不太可能跟我說實話’。”
With soaring numbers of scientists, rising investment in R&D and growing demand for medicines from an ageing population, China has all the ingredients for growth in its biotech sector. Ms Du and others like her are aiming to replicate the success of US companies such as Genentech and Amgen, which suddenly appeared in the 1980s to become forces in global pharma.
中國生物技術行業增長的條件已經全部具備：科學家數量激增、研發投資增多、日益老齡化的人口對藥品的需求日益增長。杜瑩與其他像她一樣的創業者的目標是，複製像基因泰克(Genentech)和安進(Amgen)等美國公司那樣的成功，這兩家公司在上世紀80年代橫空出世，迅速在全球製藥行業嶄露頭角。
As a service provider to local and foreign companies alike, WuXi AppTec is well placed to assess progress. Steve Yang, the company’s chief operating officer and a veteran of AstraZeneca, Pfizer and the University of California, urges caution.
藥明康德同時爲國內、外製藥公司提供服務，應該有資格評估中國在製藥領域取得的進展。但該公司首席運營官楊青(Steve Yang)呼籲保持謹慎。楊青畢業於加州大學(University of California)，曾在阿斯利康、輝瑞擔任高管。
“There is a group of Chinese companies that are well positioned, but how many years did it take for the world to appreciate Genentech? It took decades. The race is on, but it’s still very early.”
“現在有不少中國企業發展勢頭很好，但基因泰克用了多少年才獲得全世界的認可？幾十年。中國已經加入競賽，但輸贏還遠未見分曉。”
