"The collagen on the face is really enviable. "As synonymous with youth and vitality, collagen was once sought after by beauty seekers.
As we all know, collagen is closely related to the youthfulness of the company, wound repair, etc. In the human body, the collagen content is as high as 72%, which maintains the elasticity and toughness of the human body. Recombinant collagen, on the other hand, refers to collagen that is biosynthesized using DNA recombinant technology.
Some people in the industry have made a popular explanation of the concept of "recombinant collagen", assuming that the molecular structure of human collagen is a thick rope twisted into three chains, then "recombinant human collagen" is to completely reproduce such a thick rope through technical means.
In recent years, recombinant collagen has ushered in rapid development. According to public data, the scale of China's recombinant collagen market in 2022 will be 18.5 billion yuan, with an average annual compound growth rate of 65 from 2017 to 20223%, and it is expected that by 2027, the market size will reach 108.3 billion yuan.
However, like many industries, with the pursuit of capital and the increase of new entrants in the industry, the recombinant collagen market is facing "growing pains" while developing rapidly. For example, in the early stage of the development of the industry, due to the lack of unified norms, there were various names on the market only in the naming of recombinant collagen, until the State Food and Drug Administration issued its naming guidelines and interpreted themBrands and products are emerging in an endless stream, and consumers don't know much about it. There has been a lot of discussion about whether recombinant collagen is an IQ tax.
After savage growth, what does recombinant collagen rely on to support the scale of 100 billion?
A track that is favored
The body produces less and less collagen with age, and if the body is not producing enough collagen, artificial supplementation is seen as a viable option.
At present, there are two mainstream collagen extraction and preparation methods on the market, in addition to the recombinant collagen mentioned above, and the other is the more familiar animal-derived collagen, which is extracted from fish, pigs, cattle and other animals.
In recent years, the market development of recombinant collagen has caught up with animal collagen, and according to Frost & Sullivan's estimates, the average annual compound growth rate of the recombinant collagen market size reached 638%, much higher than the growth rate of the animal-derived collagen market.
Recombinant collagen overcomes the possible multiple drawbacks of traditional animal collagen, such as virus hazards, tissue rejection risks, uncertain functionality and absorption, etc., so it has a wide range of application prospects in biomedical fields such as medical dressings, injection fillers, artificial bone stents, and artificial blood vessels. Yang Suzhen, deputy general manager and technical director of Freda Biological Co., Ltd., said.
On December 15 this year, the first Recombinant Collagen Technology Summit was held in Jinan. Zhang Guifeng, a researcher at the Institute of Process Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Huang Yadong, a professor at the School of Life Science and Technology of Jinan University, Yao Min, deputy dean of the School of Clinical Medicine of the Ninth Hospital of Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Liu Wei, a consultant physician and professor of the Chinese Medical Doctor Association, and many other industry leaders participated in the sharing of recombinant collagen development, industry research results and clinical applications.
At the event, Freda Biotech Co., Ltd. showed its latest achievements in the research and development of recombinant humanized collagen technology to the industry, and announced that it had officially entered the recombinant humanized collagen and medical beauty track.
As a leading enterprise in the beauty industry, Freda Biological Co., Ltd. has always focused on the exploration and deep cultivation of the cosmetics sector, and now seizes the new blue ocean of the recombinant collagen market, and quickly realizes the layout of the whole industry chain from R&D, production and production.
It is understood that as early as 2011, the country's first recombinant collagen (human-like collagen) product for medical devices was launched. Since then, many companies have entered the game and built their own advantages, but it is not until recent years that the recombinant collagen track has ushered in a small climax.
Yang Suzhen said that under the wave of beauty economy, the important position of collagen in the field of anti-aging is becoming more and more prominent. In terms of medical aesthetics, recombinant collagen is likely to become the third commonly used medical aesthetic biomaterial in the future after hyaluronic acid and botulinum toxin based on its role. The layout of Freda Bio's recombinant collagen medical aesthetic device business is to complete the territory explored in the field of beauty industry, explore new growth points, and create the second curve of the group's growth.
The core challenge is technology
Although the recombinant collagen industry has developed rapidly in recent years, there is still a fairly high technical threshold in this field.
Yang Suzhen pointed out that the current market pattern is still relatively scattered, and the industry concentration is low, and the existing situation is caused by certain technical barriers in biosynthesis technology and huge capital investment. Specifically, it is manifested in the following aspects:
First, in terms of raw materials, there are barriers from strain construction, biosynthesis, to purification and extraction, such as the stability of the triple helix structure and the product cost brought by separation and purification
Second, in terms of industrial application, in the implantable medical aesthetic devices, the application of recombinant collagen technology in terminal products is a worldwide problem, and there is no overseas experience to refer to, and the domestic application has been at the forefront of the world, but it will take a long time to accumulate more clinical data to make mature recombinant collagen products.
In 2021, the "Guidelines for the Nomenclature of Recombinant Collagen Biomaterials" formulated by the State Food and Drug Administration divided recombinant collagen into three categories, according to the length of the selected amino acid sequence fragments and the homology with human collagen from high to low, they are divided into recombinant human collagen, recombinant humanized collagen and recombinant collagen.
If we take "carob" as an analogy and regard natural carob as human collagen, then recombinant human collagen is made through genetic engineering to produce identical carob, that is, it has a full-length amino acid sequence and triple helix structure consistent with human collagenOn the other hand, recombinant humanized collagen only selects part of the amino acid sequence fragments and repeats the splicing, similar to the beans spliced in the figure belowRecombinant human-like collagen refers to the splicing of short amino acid fragments with low homology, and the combination of functional fragments may affect the function of collagen.
Due to the limited level of biosynthesis technology, there is no recombinant human collagen on the market for the preparation of recombinant collagen in the industry, and there are only two types of products: recombinant humanized collagen and recombinant collagen. And each enterprise is based on its own technical path to build its core competitiveness.
Freda Biotech focuses on recombinant humanized collagen. Freda researchers used synthetic biology technology to accurately and scientifically select the highly bioactive site enrichment fragments in the amino acid sequence of human collagen, and obtained high-activity and high-purity recombinant humanized collagen through efficient expression, multi-stage extraction and purification of Escherichia coli, from R&D to production to industrial application, comprehensively opened up the recombinant humanized collagen industry chain, and applied for many invention patents.
The amino acid sequence of recombinant humanized collagen contains multiple active sites, which can bind to specific receptors on the cell surface, thereby regulating the expression and remodeling of the extracellular matrix, cell proliferation, recognition, adhesion and migration, cellular immune behavior, etc., so as to play an antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, promote the synthesis of a variety of collagen and elastin, and inhibit collagen degradation.
In fact, the layout and brewing of recombinant collagen has been experienced in Freda for four or five years. The layout of the production line started last year, and the biosynthesis and extraction of recombinant collagen has just been completed this year. In order to transform this technology into actual production, Freda Biological Co., Ltd. has transformed the original factory on the basis of the original factory, and the investment in equipment alone is as high as more than 100 million yuan.
In addition, Freda Biotech has also found that the combination of recombinant humanized collagen and hyaluronic acid has a synergistic effect in epidermal repair and dermal regeneration, which can achieve a breakthrough of "1+1>2" and open up a broader development space for the development of collagen.
Can it be re-created and deified?
Compared with "hyaluronic acid", which has also been used as a biosynthetic material, collagen medical aesthetic products have been approved earlier than hyaluronic acid products, but the commercialization process lags behind hyaluronic acid. Can recombinant collagen recreate the next "hyaluronic acid myth"?
First of all, it is inseparable from the healthy and orderly development of the industry. In recent years, the State Food and Drug Administration has successively promulgated a number of industry standards and policies to standardize the naming, product supervision and management and quality control of recombinant collagen biomaterials, which will undoubtedly promote the quality development of the recombinant collagen industry.
For example, on August 1, 2022, the pharmaceutical industry standard "Recombinant Collagen" was released, and the state standardized recombinant collagen, and recombinant collagen research became a hot topicAt the beginning of 2023, the State Food and Drug Administration reviewed and approved the "Industry Standard for Recombinant Humanized Collagen Medical Devices", which will be implemented in July 2023, and is also considered to be the vane of the industry towards standardization.
On the other hand, the further release of the development potential of the domestic recombinant collagen industry may also depend on the expansion of the downstream application scope and the increase of application scenarios.
It is worth mentioning that on the day of the release of the latest recombinant humanized collagen technology research and development results, Freda Biological Co., Ltd. also released a new brand of medical cosmetology, Ke Mi and products, aiming at the product use needs of the post-medical art repair scene, to create a "perioperative" refined care plan, and to create a variety of high-quality products such as medical recombinant humanized collagen repair patch, recombinant collagen anti-aging serum, recombinant collagen care gel elastic cream, recombinant collagen care essence water, recombinant humanized collagen solution and so on.
Freda's new brand of medical cosmetology is Mi.
According to the convention of empowering a brand with one technology, Kemi, as the "representative work" of Freda Biological Co., Ltd. to enter the field of medical cosmetology, is also favored by industry insiders.
The last classic successful practice case of Freda Biological Co., Ltd. is hyaluronic acid. Based on the research in the field of hyaluronic acid, Freda has successfully realized the industrialization and promotion of hyaluronic acid, and led China's hyaluronic acid industry to the world. As a hyaluronic acid skin care brand under Freda, "Yilian" has an annual revenue of more than 1 billion yuan, and "hyaluronic acid hydrating spray" has become a super single product with sales of more than 40 million. Based on the development of its brands, Freda has also become a "dark horse" in the industry. The data shows that Freda's revenue in the past 5 years (2018-2022) has increased from 22.1 billion yuan to 196.9 billion yuan, the total business volume increased by nearly 10 times.
Synthetic biology technology Freda has a technical foundation and has a successful experience that can be replicated. It is expected that through the layout of recombinant collagen raw materials and related technologies, we can provide better products for the majority of beauty seekers and meet the care needs of consumers. Yang Suzhen said that in the future, with the support of national policies for industrial development and the continuous promotion of relevant laws for industry standardization, with the continuous innovation and breakthrough of biosynthesis technology, it is believed that the penetration rate of recombinant collagen in the terminal product market will continue to increase, and in the future, China's recombinant collagen will enter a standardized and orderly development channel, and is expected to become a leader in the new track in the world.
Author: Jin Yan.
Editor: Wang Xiaoyi.