But that appears to be changing with the race for a coronavirus vaccine, with Chinese companies potentially even at the forefront.As often with China, the question is: Who are we dealing with? Who are the main vaccine developers?What is the connection to the Chinese state? And what is the outlook if China comes up with the vaccine first?
Sao Paulo State Governor Joao Doria displays the COVID-19 vaccine produced by Chinese company Sinovac Biotech during its trials in Brazil AFP/Nelson ALMEIDA Sinopharm has 150,000 employees and over 1,500 subsidiaries, including six listed companies. Vaccine development is done through two institutes of Sinopharm subsidiary China National Biotec Group: The Beijing Biological Institute and Wuhan Institute of Biological Products.
Impatient for results, China has also been bypassing its own regulatory process, which helps explain the trials on soldiers and petroleum workers. True, there is no medical company closer to the government than Sinopharm, but Sinovac was founded as a private enterprise by entrepreneur and leading vaccine scientist Weidong Yin.
Yet in terms of company ownership, there is no link with the state. CanSino is mainly owned by the founding team and venture capital firms.