Le bénéfice net a augmenté de 39,53 %, après l'entrée d'une entreprise publique, le résultat de Renfu Medical a connu une inversion de tendance

21st Century Business Herald journalist Yan Shuo

2025 is a year of major changes for Renfu Pharmaceutical. After this domestic leading enterprise in anesthetic and psychotropic drugs completed the control rights transition—from private capital to the state-owned, century-old enterprise China Merchants Group—the company delivered an annual financial report marked by revenue contraction but a significant rebound in profitability.

During the reporting period, the company’s revenue was 23.962 billion yuan, a year-on-year decline of 5.79%, while its net profit attributable to shareholders was 1.855 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 39.53%. The net profit attributable after non-recurring items rose even more significantly, up 54.75% year-on-year. The comprehensive gross margin increased to 48.21%, and operating cash flow was 2.519 billion yuan.

On one side are compliance pain points caused by an ST warning implemented for historical disclosure violations and market entry restrictions imposed on the former actual controller. On the other side are positive changes after the state-owned enterprise took over, including governance restructuring and a proactive shift toward “returning to the core and focusing.” Historical burdens that had troubled the market in recent years—such as fund occupation, financial irregularities, and asset redundancy—were basically cleared out in 2025. The anesthetic core business of Yichang Renfu grew steadily; Ge Dian Renfu’s APIs are globally leading; the innovation drug pipeline achieved breakthroughs. Overseas and domestic market expansion continued to be implemented, and the operation of core businesses remained stable.

Industry views hold that the pharmaceutical sector’s diversification trend is intensifying, and innovation capability and internationalization layouts have become the core competitive factors of the industry. Renfu Pharmaceutical has promoted internal governance improvements and rectification of its asset structure. Relying on the high industry barriers of the anesthesia segment and the company’s global R&D and production-to-sales system, its operating risks have been released to some extent, and its operating condition has gradually returned to stability. The market will continue to closely watch the effectiveness of its compliance rectification and changes in valuation.

Structural optimization of performance

From the data, in 2025 Renfu Pharmaceutical showed the characteristic of “increasing profit without increasing revenue.” Revenue recorded its first decline in nearly four years, but net profit attributable to shareholders reversed the trend of significant declines in the preceding two years. Behind the changes in key financial figures were the combined effects of changes in the industry environment, adjustments to the company’s strategy, and the clearing of historical burdens.

The financial report shows that the company’s 2025 operating revenue fell 5.79% year-on-year, mainly due to structural reform on the payment end of the pharmaceutical industry, as well as the company’s efforts to “return to the core and focus” and continuously optimize its business structure. Meanwhile, the sharp rebound on the profit side was achieved through refined management, optimization of the compensation system, controlling the scale of liabilities, and lowering financing costs. The comprehensive gross margin increased by 3.69 percentage points year-on-year to 48.21%. This was mainly driven by cost reduction and efficiency gains brought about by lean operations and upgrades to production intelligence, as well as the remarkable effectiveness of cost control for core products.

Industry insiders analyze that an important premise for this performance turnaround lies in the company’s concentrated implementation of large-scale asset impairment in 2024. In the consolidated financial statements, credit impairment and asset impairment totaled 677 million yuan. Although this caused a sharp decline in net profit for that year, it laid the groundwork for Renfu to “start fresh with a new look” in 2025.

The core supporting the company’s profitability is the central nervous system segment it has cultivated for years. This area focuses on anesthesia, analgesia, and treatment of neurological diseases, making it a core sub-segment of the global pharmaceutical market. According to the Moeng Medical database, in 2024 the sales revenue of central nervous system medications in domestic hospitals above the secondary level reached 106.6 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 4.45%. As global population aging intensifies, the prevalence of neurological and psychiatric diseases rises, and innovative therapies continue to emerge, the central nervous system segment has room for long-term development.

As a sub-sector leader, Renfu Pharmaceutical’s anesthetic products have a domestic market share exceeding 60%. Multiple key anesthetic and psychotropic products consistently rank among the top in market share. In 2025, the company’s anesthetic and psychotropic drugs achieved operating revenue of about 7.9 billion yuan, up about 6% year-on-year. The sales of products such as sufentanil hydrochloride for injection and hydromorphone hydrochloride injection increased by more than 10% year-on-year.

Its featured business segments are also being advanced in parallel. Ge Dian Renfu focuses on steroidal hormones and the field of gender health; progesterone API has the world’s #1 global market share. The transfer of API production capacity and international certifications are progressing smoothly. Its formulation business continues to receive approvals for new varieties, strengthening the advantages across the whole industry chain. Xinjiang Weiya, as the largest Uighur medicine R&D and production enterprise in China, has become a business supplement for the company thanks to the scarcity barriers of ethnic medicine.

Internationalization layout is an important support for the company’s long-term development. Currently, its business covers established markets in Europe and the United States as well as emerging markets such as Africa and Southeast Asia. In 2025, the U.S. market’s generics business revenue was 1.940 billion yuan, with its operating scale remaining stable. In Europe, multiple anesthetic products were approved for listing in Germany and France, and commercialization of innovative drugs is accelerating. Its African subsidiaries have cumulatively obtained nearly 190 drug registration approval numbers.

By the end of the reporting period, the company had accumulated more than 230 ANDA (U.S. generic drug application) approval approval numbers approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Its overseas registration and sales network continues to be improved, and the competitiveness of its globalized business has steadily increased.

Adjustment of governance structure

In 2025, the key change for Renfu Pharmaceutical was that China Merchants Group officially became the actual controller. In July last year, China Merchants, through its subsidiary China Merchants Shengke, obtained 23.70% voting rights of the former controlling shareholder Changdai Technology with a total investment amount of 11.8 billion yuan. Together with Wuhan Hi-Tech, it controlled a total of 26.62% voting rights, becoming the company’s actual controller, and the management team was adjusted accordingly.

With the state-owned enterprise taking over, the company’s historical liabilities were basically cleared, and compliance and financial risks were released. From a financial perspective, in 2025 the balance of goodwill at the end of the period decreased by 51.22% compared with the beginning of the period. After recording impairment of 373 million yuan, the book balance was left at only 356 million yuan. “The future impairment space is relatively limited. With subsidiaries turning loss into profit and impairment being handled cautiously, historical issues on the financial side have been effectively resolved,” the above-mentioned industry insider noted.

On the compliance front, issues such as non-operating fund occupation, disclosure violations, and deficiencies in financial records during 2021–2022 were all historical matters from 2022 and earlier, and they have all been fully rectified. The administrative penalties by the Hubei CSRC and the disciplinary sanctions by the Shanghai Stock Exchange have been implemented. The former actual controller, Ai Luming, was subjected to a 7-year ban from the market. Related compliance responsibilities have been pursued to the appropriate extent.

In December 2025, the company was subject to an ST warning due to historical violations. This matter does not involve delisting risk. In the view of industry insiders, with compliance rectification completed, the expectation of removing the ST designation is gradually becoming clear.

Innovative R&D is the core driver for the company’s long-term growth. With empowerment from the state-owned enterprise, the company’s R&D investment has been continuously increased, and it is moving toward an innovation-driven transformation. In 2025, the company’s R&D expenses were 1.501 billion yuan, up 2.05% year-on-year, and its R&D expense ratio reached 6.99%. The company also recently issued an announcement stating that it plans to conduct a directed share placement to its controlling shareholder China Merchants Shengke. The fund-raising size is set at a range of 3.0 billion to 3.5 billion yuan. The proceeds will be used for key projects such as innovative drug R&D and the construction of data intelligence and digitalization (数智化).

At present, Renfu Pharmaceutical has established R&D centers in Wuhan City and Yichang City in Hubei Province, as well as in New York, the United States, and Aachen, Germany. The company has more than 2,000 medical and pharmaceutical R&D personnel. It has also laid out initiatives across small-molecule innovative drugs, biologics/large-molecule innovative drugs, traditional Chinese medicine (ethnic medicine), and innovative varieties of improved formulations.

The company currently has more than 60 in-development innovative drugs of categories 1 and 2. HW241045 tablets have become the first AT2R agonist to enter the clinic in China. HW201877 capsules are the world’s first 15-PGDH inhibitor for the treatment of inflammatory bowel disease. Multiple Category 1 new drugs have entered the clinical stage, and the innovative pipeline is gradually moving into the harvest period. Continued increases in R&D investment will provide important support for the company to break through the ceiling of its main business and unlock long-term growth potential.

Renfu Pharmaceutical has proposed a 2026 target: it plans to achieve operating revenue of at least 24.5 billion yuan, with a comprehensive gross margin of at least 48%. The company will build a business layout with coordinated development and resource linkage around three major segments: “pillar,” “incremental growth,” and “characteristics.” It will consolidate its leading position in the anesthesia drug field, strengthen its global operating system, focus on R&D efficiency and frontier technology innovation, and optimize its business structure to create a new growth engine.

With governance becoming standardized and its operating structure continuously optimized, the company—leveraging its main-business barriers and globalized layout—will maintain stable operations amid industry diversification. Its value for long-term growth is expected to be promising.

Massive information, precise interpretation—available on the Sina Finance APP