Global pharmaceutical giant Novartis is deepening its commitment to China, citing the country's growing role in healthcare innovation and its evolving medical ecosystem as key drivers for continued investment, said Leo Lee, president and managing director of Novartis China.
Speaking in an exclusive interview with China Global Television Network (CGTN) on the sidelines of the 2026 Summer Davos forum in Dalian on Wednesday, Lee said the Swiss multinational pharmaceutical corporation remains confident in the Chinese market and sees significant opportunities in areas including cardiovascular disease, cancer, immunology and neurology.
"We're very excited about the China market. We have been actually in China now for about 140 years, and I think you know very well our name itself, 'Nuohua' [in Chinese], means a commitment to China. I think for us, we focus on four therapeutic areas: cardiovascular disease, treating cancers, immunology, and also neurology. In China, we do see that for a Healthy China 2030, the areas of cardiovascular disease and also managing cancers are areas of high unmet medical needs. So, from that perspective, we're very committed to ensuring that we bring all of our most important medicines to China to support patients and ensure that patients will have the healthiest, highest quality [of life]," Lee said.
Beyond market demand, Lee said China's policy support for innovation and the continued development of its healthcare system have strengthened the country's appeal for global pharmaceutical companies.
"We're very, very positive about the policies in China that are really pro-innovation. We also see that the healthcare system has continuously evolved to mature and to be able to support more and more patients, not only in primary care but secondary and tertiary [care]. So we think China is an incredibly good environment for innovation of medicines," he said.
China's role in the global pharmaceutical industry has also undergone a significant transformation in recent years. Once viewed mainly as a market for innovative medicines and a manufacturing base for generic drugs, the country is increasingly becoming a source of cutting-edge research and drug development.
"If you go back over 10 years, China was traditionally importing a lot of innovative medicines and had an extremely strong base of generic manufacturing. I think over the last 10 years, China has gone through an incredible evolution, and especially in the last two or three years we started to see that 30 percent of all biotech clinical development programs originated in China. So we think China is going to be an incredible engine for driving development of new medicines not only for Chinese patients but also for patients outside of China. From that point of view, we want to be a partner to support Chinese innovation if they want to reach patients outside of China. Within China, we really think that it is important that we continue to expand our research, development, as well as manufacturing, so that Novartis benefits from the incredible ecosystem that exists here today," said Lee.
The event, also known as the World Economic Forum (WEF)'s 17th Annual Meeting of the New Champions, drew to a close on Thursday in the northeastern Chinese city of Dalian, highlighting that innovation matters more than ever in an age of accelerating technological change and rising uncertainty, with China playing a pivotal role.
Under the theme of "Innovating at Scale", the three-day forum brought together over 1,700 participants from more than 90 countries and regions to discuss ways to scale innovation into better jobs, stronger economies and new growth opportunities.
Novartis bets on China's growing role in healthcare innovation
