PPC Group
Ushering a New Era among China-Centric CROs

Over the last three decades, the pharmaceutical industry has experienced radical growth owing to the pressing need to increase profit margins and adhere to the ever-changing regulatory guidelines. Primarily in the US and EU, innovation and novel drug development initiatives have reached unprecedented counts unlike the number of Asia-Pacific based CROs. Amidst this, many companies in the healthcare industry have faced slack for sporadic costs and thinning pipelines, and only some have attained the desired results from such travails. Jason Zhu is one of those few.

A Peek into Jason’s Illustrious Career

Jason translated his experience in clinical trials in China and has proudly be part of the PPC Group since 2017. Prior to starting PPC Group, Zhu worked as a physician in Huashan Hospital for two years and also served as the CEO for HaiHe Pharmaceutical, the Global Vice President of IQVIA, and China General Manager of Omnicare. Jason has cooperated with over 50 China local pharmaceutical and biotech companies and has led the design and execution in more than 100 phase I to IV clinical trials.

Today, he serves as the CEO of PPC and this firm is playing an exemplary role in serving pharmaceutical and biotech companies in the APAC region by offering clinical trial services for both small molecule generic and novel drugs. During its journey of over two decades, PPC has completed over 2000 early phase trials, including innovative phase I pharmacokinetic, generic bioequivalence, and biosimilar studies for several pharmaceutical companies.

As one of the leading CROs in Asia Pacific, the firm offers comprehensive services for early-stage clinical trials and enables physicians to manage and conduct first-in-human and phase I studies in its clinical phase I units.

PPC Group has completed over 2000 early phase trials, including innovative phase I pharmacokinetic, generic bioequivalence, and biosimilar studies for several pharmaceutical companies

PPC also has a clinical CRO team who are dedicated in clinical and data research. “It’s primarily our medical service. Then we have a data management team who store clinical trial data and accordingly prepare reports.” Adding to this, PPC Group has a monitoring team for continuously overseeing study data and patient safety. Furthermore, PPC houses two bioanalytical laboratories in China and Taiwan as another core subsidiary. These labs aid physicians in every stage of molecule development and supports researches in Pharmacokinetics (PK) analysis, Bioavailability and Bioequivalence studies, and Drug-drug interaction studies.

Further, Jason mentions that during clinical trials, the pharmaceutical industry often faces hindrances to adhere to several stringent regulatory rules of this space such as FDA, PMDA, NMPA, ANSM, and NCPB. To this end, PPC Group guides its clients about the regulatory changes happening in the compliance space and subsequently enables them to reach their business endeavors. To substantiate the statement, Jason elucidates an example. Here, one of its clients conducting osteoporosis studies were facing difficulties to submit their IND dossier as they had a single robust animal model. “As per NMPA regulations, anyone engaging in osteoporosis studies must possess two animal models to submit IND dossier,” states Jason. To help this client, PPC Group brought forth its years of experience in the therapeutic area and guided the client while studying different osteoporosis processes and subsequently submit their studies for clinical research.

Currently, the firm operates in China, Japan, Taiwan, and Korea. In the days ahead, PPC Group envisions diversifying to Philippines, Vietnam, Thailand and many more Asia Pacific countries. Further, in a couple of years, the firm aims to augment its number of employees to 700 in China and 300 combined in Korea and Taiwan. “Gradually, we intend to be a global CRO in five years while remaining China-Centric,” concludes Zhu.