A latest round of SEC filings from biopharma companies shows at least a dozen companies highlighting the Biosecure Act as a major incoming risk, as they would have to transition away from many Chinese suppliers over the next eight years.
While it’s not certain that the bill will become law, some companies are already taking closer looks at their supply chains.
“We are actively reviewing our engagements with Chinese-based suppliers,” Alnylam spokesperson Christine Lindenboom told Endpoints News via email.
The company said in an SEC filing earlier this month that it works with companies in China that may be impacted by the bipartisan legislation that has advanced in both the House and Senate. Politico reported Monday that the House was preparing to bring the Biosecure Act to a vote next month.
The momentum for the law has made startups and venture investors cautious. Last week, R&D contractor Charles River’s CEO Jim Foster told investors that “a couple of very big venture capital firms” instructed their portfolio of companies “‘not to do work in China.'”
“They didn’t say we would prefer you don’t use China. They said, we don’t want you to,” he said, according to a transcript of their earnings results.
A spokesperson for Verve Therapeutics also told Endpoints the company “is diversifying the vendor base we use to manufacture our product candidates to alternate vendors outside of China.”
Smaller biopharma companies relying on Chinese suppliers for a lot of their work are also sounding the alarm.
Viridian Therapeutics said in an SEC filing last week that it works with WuXi AppTec and WuXi Biologics, both of which are named in the Biosecure Act as “companies of concern,” and if it becomes necessary to shift away from WuXi or other non-US-based CROs and CMOs, “we will need to find suitable replacements for their services.” That could increase costs, or reduce or eliminate the supplies of materials that make up their products, the company said in its filing, but did not respond to a request for further comment.
Ryan Asay, SVP of corporate affairs at Revolution Medicines, told Endpoints via email the company “initiated activities related to alternative supply chain sourcing prior to the introduction of the Biosecure Act,” but declined further comment.
Other small companies like Bicycle Therapeutics, Poseida Therapeutics and C4 Therapeutics also mention Biosecure as a potential risk in earnings filings from this month.
But larger companies seemed less averse to the bill. Eli Lilly said in a filing last week it doesn’t anticipate a material impact based on the text of the bill as currently written. BioNTech mentioned the risk in an SEC filing, but declined to comment further.
In addition to the Biosecure Act, other anti-China legislation has emerged as well. Rep. Elissa Slotkin, a Democrat from Michigan who’s in a tight Senate race, introduced a bipartisan bill last week that would encourage the use of US-based biopharma manufacturers.
“Ensuring that America can produce cost-effective life-saving medicines is a national security issue because relying on other countries leaves us vulnerable to global supply chain blocks and shortages,” said Rep. Don Bacon (R-NE), a co-sponsor of the bill.