While the world gawks at AI demos and frets about critical minerals, China has been quietly loading the cannon in an entirely different direction. At its latest plenary meeting (Beijing’s equivalent of a high-stakes strategic retreat without the name badges, trust falls and someone earnestly suggesting a mindfulness breakout session… although who knows!), the leadership unveiled early contours of the 15th Five-Year Plan. The message between the lines is unmistakable: biomanufacturing is the pillar of its next industrial era.
Five-Year Plans are always tea-leaf reading exercises, but this one feels different. The phrasing, the sequencing, the sudden elevation of new industries all point to a country recalibrating for a far more unpredictable world than the one mapped five years ago. Beijing has already christened this plan a “crucial link” in China’s march toward full modernization by 2035. And in that hierarchy of priorities, technology is no longer a supporting actor, it’s the arena in which global power will be contested.
Biomanufacturing Muscles To The Front
Here’s the headline few people seem to have noticed: biomanufacturing now sits beside quantum tech, hydrogen energy, and nuclear fusion at the top tier of China’s future-industries agenda. “Biotechnology” was yesterday’s vocabulary, broad, aspirational, research-centric. “Biomanufacturing” is today’s language: industrial, scaled, and unapologetically commercial.
This isn’t a vision. It’s a build-out.
And Beijing just tipped its hand.
The Big Reveal: 43 New Scale-Up Facilities
In a joint announcement, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) and the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) published a list of 43 companies chosen to construct new biomanufacturing pilot and scale-up facilities. The sheer number dwarfs anything being attempted elsewhere, and may even overshadow other Chinese industrial initiatives in emerging tech.
It’s an industrial moonshot hiding in plain sight.
Reading the Roster
A few patterns jump off the page:
- Industrial biology dominates. Food additives, materials, enzymes, these companies make things. This is biology as manufacturing.
- Food-and-additives firms lead the pack. It’s the largest group by far, perhaps signaling where near-term commercial wins lie.
- Biopharma plays a supporting role. Once the crown jewel of biological innovation, it now sits mid-table. The message? China sees biology not as a healthcare specialty, but as a general-purpose platform technology.
And yet, almost unbelievably, there’s been no real English-language coverage. The world is too busy watching humanoid robots do backflips.
43 Pilot Companies English
- JOINN Bio (Beijing JOINN Biologics Co., Ltd.) – Biopharma拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Tianjin University – Frontier Institute of Synthetic Biology – Biopharma拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- CAS Tianjin Institute of Industrial Biotechnology – Food & Additives, Biopharma, Enzymes拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Bloomage Biotech (Tianjin) – Cosmetics, Food & Additives, Biopharma拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Beijing University of Chemical Technology – Qinhuangdao Bioindustrial Research Institute – Biochemical Engineering拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Inner Mongolia University of Technology – Food & Additives, Biopharma拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Dalian Practical Biotech Co., Ltd. – Plant Cell Platforms (Plant chassis development)拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Changchun Institute of Biological Products Co., Ltd. – Biopharma (Vaccines)拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- NHU Biotech (Heilongjiang Xinhua Cheng Biotechnology) – Food & Additives拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- SDIC Advanced Biofuel (Hailun) Co., Ltd. – Bioenergy, Lignocellulose Utilization拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Shenghejianwu (Shanghai) Biotechnology Co., Ltd. – Food & Additives, Biopharma拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Shanghai SynBio Oasis Biotechnology Co., Ltd. – Biochemical Engineering拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Eicolai Biotech (AibioChem) – Food & Additives拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Vazyme Biotech (Nanjing Vazyme Biotech Co., Ltd.) – Enzymes拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Nanjing Normal University – Changzhou Synthetic Biology Industry Research Institute – Food & Additives, Cosmetics拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Suzhou Womei Biotech Co., Ltd. – Food & Additives, Biopharma拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- WeCare Probiotics (Suzhou) – Food & Additives (Probiotics)拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Wenzhou Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences – Biopharma拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Zhejiang Marine Development Research Institute – Food & Additives (Marine)拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Transfar YiXun New Materials Co., Ltd. – Food & Additives, Biochemical Engineering拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Anhui Huaheng Biotechnology Co., Ltd. – Food & Additives, Biochemical Engineering拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Hefei National Laboratory for Health Research – Biopharma拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Xiang’an Innovation Laboratory (Xiamen University) – Biopharma拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Jiangxi Microalgae Resource & Environmental Tech Co., Ltd. – Food & Additives, Plant Cell Platforms (Microalgae)拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Qilu Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. – Biopharma拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Shandong Longtec Enzyme Co., Ltd. – Enzymes拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Shandong University – National Key Lab of Microbial Technology – Food & Additives, Enzymes拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Henan Scientific Achievement Transfer Biotechnology Co., Ltd. – Food & Additives, Enzymes拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Hubei University – Enzymes, Biochemical Engineering拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Huazhong Agricultural University – Biopharma, Enzymes拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- CABIO Biotech (Wuhan) – Food & Additives拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Angel Yeast Co., Ltd. – Food & Additives, Enzymes (Yeast fermentation)拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Truking Technology Co., Ltd. – Biopharma (Biomanufacturing equipment)拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Hunan Biomanufacturing Pilot Base Co., Ltd. – Food & Additives, Enzymes, Biopharma (Mixed biomanufacturing)拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- MoonBio (Guangzhou) – Food & Additives拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Nanning Hanhe Biotechnology Co., Ltd. – Food & Additives, Biopharma拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Sanya BGI Life Science Research Institute – Biochemical Engineering拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Chongqing Ansaibo New Materials Technology Co., Ltd. – Plant Cell Platforms (Plant chassis)拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Chengdu Yatu Biotech Co., Ltd. – Biopharma拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Chengdu Jinkai Bioengineering Co., Ltd. – Food & Additives, Cosmetics, Enzymes拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Institute of Medical Biology, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences (CAMS) – Biopharma拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Ningxia CAS New Biomaterials Co., Ltd. – Biochemical Engineering拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
- Yili Chuan Ning Biotechnology Co., Ltd. – Biopharma, Cosmetics拟发布的生物制造中试能力建设平台名单（第一批）
The Quiet Race Has Already Started
The 43 facilities are not the story, they’re just the beginning.
While everyone else is distracted, China is laying the foundations of a biological manufacturing superpower. And it’s doing it with a discipline and scale the rest of the world hasn’t begun to reckon with.