Harbour BioMed builds momentum for next era

Founded in 2016 through the acquisition of Harbour Antibodies, a Netherlands-based antibody technology platform company, Hong Kong-listed Harbour BioMed aspired from day one to become a leading global platform-based biopharmaceutical company. Today, after a decade of transformation, it stands ready to embark on a new chapter in that journey.

According to Wang Jingsong, founder, chairman and CEO of Harbour BioMed, the company has achieved significant breakthroughs in technology platform development, global collaborations, and pipeline advancement — establishing a solid foundation for pursuing its long-term ambitions. Its robust profitability and China's strong policy support for innovative drugs have further bolstered the company's confidence in its growth trajectory.

For the 2025 financial year, Harbour BioMed recorded revenue of $158 million, representing a year-on-year increase of 314.6 percent. Net profit surged to approximately $92 million, a 33-fold increase compared to 2024, marking the company's third consecutive year of positive earnings. In the first half of 2026, the company reported revenue of $122.5 million, increasing by 20.9 percent year-on-year. Net profit for the period reached $64.9 million.

"In the past 10 years, Harbour BioMed has successfully evolved from a pure technology platform into a full-fledged product development company, demonstrating the strength of our proprietary platform and global operational capabilities," said Wang. "Looking ahead, we are committed to continuously developing innovative drugs that address major diseases in the global market. Beyond our core focus areas of immuno-oncology and immunology, we plan to expand into central nervous system, metabolic diseases and more."

Discovery engine

In the coming years, Harbour BioMed will continue to leverage its core technology platform — Harbour Mice, which can generate fully human monoclonal antibodies in both the conventional two-heavy-chain and two-light-chain format, or H2L2, and the heavy-chain-only format, or HCAb — to drive next-generation therapeutics within the industry.

According to Wang, the platform, which features strong intellectual property protection worldwide, is akin to NVIDIA chips: "You don't necessarily see it in the final product, but it is the fundamental infrastructure that makes the product possible."

"Harbour Mice delivers fully human antibodies in a single step, eliminating immune rejection and toxicity," Wang explained. "As the industry pivots from monoclonals to complex molecules — bispecifics, multi-specifics, antibody-drug conjugates and cell therapies — the platform has become an essential core module for building these next-generation drugs. Its applications continue to expand from oncology and immunology into metabolic diseases, central nervous system diseases and beyond."

The technology platform has been utilized by a majority of the top 10 global pharmaceutical companies, including Pfizer, AstraZeneca, Bristol Myers Squibb — a rarity for any Chinese company and a testament to the platform's industry-leading position, according to Wang.

In the era of artificial intelligence, Harbour BioMed is integrating its Harbour Mice platform with AI to accelerate innovation.

"AI is already core to everything we do. We have a dedicated AI office to coordinate our business operations, an AI for the Science team for project development, and also a chief AI officer," said Wang. "AI is no longer the future — it is already now, embedded across everything from basic operations to core product development and platform technology."

In 2025, Harbour BioMed launched its first fully human generative AI HCAb model, powered by its self-developed Hu-mAtrIx™ AI platform. Built on more than 9 million next-generation sequencing-derived HCAb sequences, the platform integrates AI-driven design, intelligent screening and wet-lab validation to establish a closed-loop discovery process for antibody development. Preclinical data for its first AI-enabled drug candidate, LET003, a potential best-in-class therapy for obesity treatment, was released in May.

On June 15, Harbour BioMed announced a strategic partnership with BioMap, a global leader in AI foundation models for life sciences, to jointly launch MegaStream TechBio, a next-generation AI-native pipeline company targeting global markets.

"This joint venture is about breaking the old drug development rulebook — 10 years, a 1-in-10,000 success rate, and a billion dollars," said Wang. "We're making drug discovery predictable and scalable."

Strategic alliances

Over the past several years, Harbour BioMed has steadily transformed the strength of its technology platforms into high-value global partnerships. In 2025 alone, it established several collaborations with global biotechnology innovators and multinational pharmaceutical companies, including Windward Bio, AstraZeneca, Otsuka, Pfizer and Bristol Myers Squibb.

The expanding partnership with AstraZeneca, announced in March 2025, stands out as a significant milestone in Harbour BioMed's evolution of its partnership model. This long-term global strategic collaboration transcends traditional product licensing, featuring an innovative, multi-faceted framework that encompasses joint research and development efforts, equity investment and the creation of the Harbour BioMed-AstraZeneca Innovation Lab. The initial collaboration is set for five years, with the possibility of extending for an additional five years. A similar partnership was also established with Bristol Myers Squibb in late 2025.

In the upcoming years, Harbour BioMed will continue to pursue deeper collaborations with global companies to fully realize the value of its platform. According to Wang, the model has also been discussed with several leading global investment institutions and smaller international companies.

"We will expand deeper partnerships with more companies to maintain stable development," said Wang.

Pipeline expansion

Over the past 10 years, in addition to advancing platform innovation, Harbour BioMed has been committed to building a robust and differentiated pipeline of innovative therapeutics that address diseases with significant unmet medical needs.

To date, the company has developed nearly 30 drug candidates spanning from preclinical research to late-stage clinical development. A broad portfolio has been established across immunology, oncology, metabolic diseases and central nervous system disorders. In addition, the company is also expanding into next-generation modalities, including bispecifics, multi-specifics, antibody-drug conjugates and cell therapies.

Wang said that, barring unforeseen delays, the company is on track to receive its first marketing approval in the near term. Looking ahead to 2028-29, the company expects a broader portfolio of pipeline assets to advance into late-stage clinical trials or achieve regulatory approval for commercialization.

Scientific ecosystem

As it works toward its long-term goal, Harbour BioMed is also keen to take on greater responsibility for supporting the development of the global innovation ecosystem in the years ahead. The company aims to serve as an incubation platform that helps top scientists around the world commercialize their research.

According to the company, the Harbour Mice platform has been adopted by more than 140 industrial and academic partners worldwide, with over 380 collaboration projects underway. More than 20 molecules generated from the platform have advanced to the investigational new drug or clinical stage.

Incubation is also progressing smoothly. Wang said the company has incubated several ventures across cutting-edge therapeutic areas, ranging from multivalent antibodies to cell therapies. These include collaborations with NK Cell-Tech on NK cell therapies and with Elance Therapeutics on next-generation obesity treatments, among others. Harbour BioMed has also cofounded Sobour Biopharma to develop innovative therapies for cancer and inflammatory diseases.

HBM Alpha Therapeutics is a joint venture established in 2019 between Harbour BioMed and Boston Children's Hospital, focusing on rare genetic diseases such as congenital adrenal hyperplasia and polycystic ovary syndrome. The company completed its seed financing in 2023. In 2025, it entered into a strategic collaboration and license agreement with a business partner to advance novel therapies targeting corticotropin-releasing hormone. The transaction also marked Harbour BioMed's partial exit from its first global NewCo.

In the Netherlands, where its journey began, Harbour BioMed plans to establish a scholarship in Erasmus University Rotterdam to nurture future talent, according to Wang.

"We aim to support young scholars and students with forward-thinking ideas and translational research potential," he said. "This allows our collaboration with the Netherlands to go beyond merely leveraging existing technologies and scientific advances — making us an integral part of the local innovation ecosystem."

Looking to the future, Harbour BioMed is ready to ascend to a new level of influence in the pharmaceutical industry. Wang underscored that the company's foundational philosophy will endure: "Innovation fuels our core, while collaboration gives us lift. We have lived by this for the past decade, and we will carry it forward as our promise for the future."