Pharmaceutical R&D companies in China are increasingly turning to local suppliers for an essential lab material called reagents. Industry executives say the company aims to cut costs and speed up delivery times with this shift.
For years, foreign suppliers like Thermo Fisher Scientific (U.S.) and Merck (Germany) dominated China’s reagent market, selling the compounds used for lab tests and quality control. But rising import tariffs—sparked by the U.S.-China trade war and growing concerns about price and supply reliability are pushing Chinese firms toward homegrown alternatives such as Shanghai Titan Scientific and Nanjing Vazyme Biotech.
According to UN Comtrade data, China’s imports of lab and diagnostic reagents were worth $5.76 billion in 2024, a small drop from 2023. Many in the industry believe that number will fall further as local sourcing gains momentum.
Ma Xingquan, co-president of ChemPartner PharmaTech, said local reagents are better for time-sensitive research. His company already sources most of its pre-clinical reagents from Chinese makers like Titan and Shanghai Aladdin Biochemical Technology, and he expects that share to grow as more local options hit the market.
The switch accelerated in April, when China raised tariffs on U.S. goods to 125% although the rate has since been lowered during trade talks, the sudden jump convinced many drugmakers to act quickly. Vazyme Senior VP Xu Xiaoyu said that before April, customers only talked about replacing imported reagents “someday.” After the tariff hike, over 90% started actively considering local options.
Broker forecasts show the trend is paying off for local companies:
- Analysts expect Titan’s revenue to grow 22% in 2025 to 3.52 billion yuan (\$490 million), and they project Vazyme’s revenue to rise 15% to 1.59 billion yuan.
Investors have noticed too—Titan’s shares are up about 54% this year and Vazyme’s about 18%, while Merck and Thermo Fisher’s shares have fallen roughly 21% and 8% respectively.
Analysts say there’s still a lot of room for local products to replace imported reagents, and customer interest in Chinese-made alternatives has never been stronger.
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