On October 23rd, the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China released the "Proposal for Formulating the 15th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development" (hereinafter referred to as the "15th Five-Year Plan"). The Central Committee of the Communist Party of China held a press conference on the morning of the 24th to introduce and interpret the spirit of the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee.
The Secretary-General and Director of the National Development and Reform Commission, Zheng Gese, introduced that innovation-driven development means fostering and expanding emerging industries and future industries. In 2024, the added value of the "new three" economy in China will account for more than 18% of the GDP.
The "Proposal of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Formulating the 14th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development" suggests making forward-looking arrangements for future industries, and promoting quantum technology, biomanufacturing, hydrogen and nuclear fusion energy, brain-computer interface, embodied intelligence, sixth-generation mobile communication, etc. to become new growth points. These industries are gathering momentum and will create a new high-tech industry in China in the next 10 years.
The proposal also suggests improving the new national-led system and taking extraordinary measures to comprehensively promote the research and development of key core technologies in key fields such as integrated circuits, industrial mother machines, high-end instruments, basic software, advanced materials, and biomanufacturing, with the aim of achieving decisive breakthroughs.
The global market size of biopharmaceuticals is expected to exceed 8 trillion US dollars by 2030, which will bring continuous growth opportunities for Chinese biopharmaceuticals. The technology of Chinese biopharmaceuticals has evolved from "following" to "co-running" (with some areas leading the way), and its competitive话语权 has been continuously enhanced. International cooperation has shifted from product exports to value output. In the first half of 2025， the outbound licensing (License-out) reached 66 billion US dollars. The "13th Five-Year Plan" has once again listed biopharmaceuticals as a "core track of future industries", and full policy support has been provided for the entire chain.
Meanwhile, brain-computer interfaces are another "future industry". In 2024, the scale of China's brain-computer interface industry was approximately 32 billion yuan, accounting for 15% of the global market. Among them, the application in medical health dominated, with a market size of about 25 billion yuan, accounting for 78%, mainly used in stroke rehabilitation, epilepsy warning, and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis-assisted communication, etc. In the global market structure, China, the United States, and the European Union form the first tier. Among them, the United States leads with a 45% market share, and China ranks second. It is expected that the central government's investment in brain-computer interfaces will exceed 20 billion yuan from 2026 to 2030. China's brain-computer interface patents account for 33% of the global total, clinical trials account for 34%, the number of enterprises accounts for 25%, and project financing amounts account for 28%.
The "14th-15th Five-Year Plan" proposed "accelerating the construction of a Healthy China", covering aspects such as healthcare, medicine, medical insurance, and health. This content is not significantly different from previous industry policies and documents. It reiterates the coordinated development and governance of healthcare, medical insurance, and medicine, promoting hierarchical medical treatment, maintaining the public nature of public hospitals, strengthening county-level and grassroots medical services; promoting traditional Chinese medicine and integration of traditional and Western medicine, supporting the development of innovative drugs and medical devices, strengthening the health of women and children, and developing integrated medical care and elderly care services to address population aging. I believe that the content of "promoting the digitalization construction of universal health" in this part is particularly worthy of attention. In the era of AI, this part has great potential.
The "14-15" plan also proposed to fully implement the "Artificial Intelligence +" initiative, using artificial intelligence to lead the transformation of scientific research paradigms, strengthening the integration of artificial intelligence with industrial development, cultural construction, people's livelihood security, and social governance, seizing the commanding heights of artificial intelligence industry application, and providing all-round empowerment to various industries. This part of the content is also very crucial. The combination of artificial intelligence and medicine, and artificial intelligence and medical health will inevitably promote the "huge transformation" of the future pharmaceutical and healthcare industry.
The "14th Five-Year Plan" clearly states the development of bio-manufacturing and support for the development of innovative drugs and medical devices. It also emphasizes the use of a new national system to tackle core technologies, and the outlined upgrade path of the industrial chain is also clearly visible. In the next five years, we have reason to believe that from raw materials to innovative drugs, from equipment to services, a resilient pharmaceutical industry ecosystem will gradually mature.
