Daily Brief Health Care: CSPC Pharmaceutical Group, WuXi AppTec Co. Ltd., Context Therapeutics and more

• China approved its first homegrown Covid-19 vaccine using the advanced mRNA technology, months after the country pivoted from its “zero-Covid” strategy toward living with the virus.
• The vaccine, developed by CSPC Pharmaceutical Group Ltd., was approved for emergency use by the National Medical Products Administration.
• The shot, known as SYS6006, primarily targets the omicron variant BA.5 and can be stored at 2 to 8 degrees Celsius (36 to 46 degrees Fahrenheit) “for a long time,”.

• If WuXi Chemistry’s performance shows downward trend, the overall performance growth won’t be satisfactory. The negative growth of WuXi DDSU means that ineffective competition for domestic innovative drugs is decreasing.
• The asset structure is shifting from light asset to heavy asset.It’s particularly crucial whether business model of “one-stop end-to-end service+royalty income” can enable WuXi AppTec to explore new growth points. 
• The current sentiment on CXO is “fragile” because CXO doesn’t have performance sustainability and stability, with “risk discount” problem. Its valuation haven’t reached inflection point. Without industry beta,alpha is useless.

In an unexpected move, Context Therapeutics has announced that it will be discontinuing further development work on its ONA-XR program and prioritize the development of its novel preclinical bispecific CLDN6xCD3 antibody, CTIM-76. While we view the news as disappointing given efficacy data in the OATH study were encouraging, we understand the need to prioritize safety for patients. With a market cap of $11m, Context is trading well below cash levels (end-FY22 cash balance of $35.5m). We have withdrawn our estimates and will revisit our model assumptions and overall valuation in due course. We note that the discontinuation of the ONA-XR programs allows Context to extend its cash runway to late 2024 (versus early 2024 previously), well past the planned IND filing of CTIM-76 in Q124.