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The 2017 Shenzhen International Biotech Summit and the Biology and Health Industry Expo will be held at the Shenzhen Convention and Exhibition Center from Sept. 21 to 23, a press conference was told yesterday.
“The output value of the biology and health industry in Shenzhen reached 200 billion yuan (US$29.41 billion) last year, with a year-on-year growth of 15 percent,” said Wu You, deputy secretary general of the city government.
According to him, the city government has offered financial aid and policy support to bolster the growth of the biology and health industry in Shenzhen. He said the development of many biotechnologies in Shenzhen, such as biomedicine engineering, DNA sequencing, bio-information analysis and cell therapy, has outpaced many other cities in the world.
This year’s summit will cover certain hot topics in the biotech industry, such as precision medicine, big data in health care, immunotherapy and genetic drugs. Nearly 90 guests, consisting of biotech entrepreneurs, academicians and investors from home and abroad, will attend the summit to promote academic exchange, policy analysis and industrial cooperation.
Huang Shifang, deputy director of the city’s council for the promotion of international trade, said over 200 biotech companies from China, Japan, South Korea, the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, Israel and other countries will showcase their latest products and lab achievements at the expo.
According to him, match-making events will be held for biotech companies seeking potential clients and investors to commercialize their research findings. The expo will include a job fair for the first time, enabling biotech companies to recruit professional talents during the expo.
Lepu Medical, a Beijing-based company specializing in developing high-tech medical devices, has set up its international development center in Shenzhen. Guo Tongjun, the company’s vice president, said the company chose Shenzhen because it was impressed by the city’s good investment environment, sufficient talent pipeline and high government efficiency.
He said the company is the only biotech company in China capable of producing biodegradable stents. “It is estimated that 90 percent of the biodegradable stents in China will be produced in Shenzhen in the future,” he said.
