Good evening everyone, investors and analysts, and welcome to WuXi XDC 2025 Full-Year Earnings Conference Call. This is Chris Fang, Head of company IR, and I will be the facilitator for today's call. Our earnings presentation material has been uploaded to the company website earlier today, and you are welcome to download and review them. Let me introduce our management team joining us today. Our Company's CEO, Dr. Jimmy Li, and also Company CFO, Mr. Michael Xi. During the first part of the call, our CEO and CFO will provide a brief overview of our business performance and also the financial highlights. We will then open the floor for a Q&A session to discuss our business and related topics in great detail. Before we proceed, I would like to remind you that certain statements made today during this call may be forward-looking statements.
These statements are based on current expectations and may be subject to risks and uncertainties. Without further ado, I will now turn the call over to our CEO, Dr. Jimmy Li. Jimmy, please go ahead.
Okay. Thank you, Chris, and welcome and thank you for attending our 2025 earnings results. Yeah, I mean, let's go to next slide. This is a brief content of tonight's presentation. I will start with annual results highlight, followed by business and operations updates. Then Michael will go over the financial results, you know, with everyone. Then I will come back to wrap up with a quick outlook and summary. Okay, next slide. 2025 overall, we deliver another outstanding year, outstanding results. You know, this is basically a brief summary of the projects as well as the financial metrics. In terms of projects, we signed a record of 70 new ICMC projects.
That's actually a big jump from the previous two years. Also, we signed another record 10 new PPQ projects in 2025. Our current active CMC projects number reached 252 by end of last year, and the total PPQ projects reached 18. There's also one client's commercial projects ongoing. On the financial side, you know, our top-line revenue increased by 46.7% to you know RMB 5.94 billion. Gross profit grew higher to 72.5% year-over-year, you know, to slightly below RMB 2.14 billion. Adjusted net also grew close to 70% year-over-year.
We are excited to share that our backlog continued to grow very strongly, reached close to $1.5 billion, which is, you know, over 50% year-over-year growth of the backlog. That provides a lot of certainty, you know, for 2026. Next slide. A little bit more in terms of the different areas of the achievements. First in terms of innovation and execution. Our total client number continued to increase to over 640. We have helped clients submitted over 120 global INDs by 2025 accumulatively.
Also, we continue to expand our market share by end of 2025 based on our own estimate our market share has reached over 24%. We also make a lot of breakthroughs in our innovation and technology platform. Basically both in terms of the conjugation which we upgraded to WuXi XDC as well as also on linker and payloads as well as the connectors. That includes the X-LinC connector and then a novel linker-payload with the name of WuXiTecan-1 and WuXiTecan-2. I will share later on in terms of how we actually leverage those innovation to basically create you know additional value for clients as well as for our business. Global footprint continue to expand.
In China, besides WuXi and Shanghai, we also made a small acquisition in Hefei. We are basically starting the design and construction of a very large linker payload dedicated commercial site in Jiangyin. We also continue to make a very good progress in Singapore in 2025. DP capacity expansion has been, you know, one of the focus area in the past couple of years. We continue to expand and on target to more than double that capacity by 2029. I mentioned Singapore site.
We achieved the mechanical completion milestone in June of 2025, and we are currently on target for GMP release of the site in first half of 2026, followed by GMP manufacturing in second half of the year. We also continue to expand in terms of our talent pool. By end of 2025, our headcount reached over 2,600, and including you know, more than 600 newly added in 2025. We continue to, you know, receive great recognitions from the industry, evidenced by two awards that basically are the most important awards from the ADC industry.
That includes the three consecutive years in a row for best CDMO, as well as the first time for best CRO award in November 2025 at the World ADC Awards. I wanted to also mention that, you know, those two were the only two service awards given out at the World ADC Conference. Basically, we won, you know, both of the most important awards. And those were basically voted by, you know, industry leaders. This is actually a best reflection, you know, of our contribution to the global ADC and XDC industry. With that, let me go into a little bit more details in terms of our business and operations.
This is the funnel that you are probably quite familiar with. It also best represents our business model as a CRDMO. The numbers are basically the project numbers at different stages. At the discovery stage, you know, our total project number cumulatively reach over 1,000. Importantly, you know, we continue to help clients to move forward, you know, pre-clinical candidates to CMC stage. That is an important outcome of our discovery service, and basically we call that the enabled discovery to PCC. The total number reached to 69 by end of 2025.
Also in 2025 alone, we helped global clients submit 38 INDs globally, which is the largest proportion globally, you know, from any CDMO or any company basically in that category. Our projects continue to advance further down the funnel. If you look at the phase II, phase III project number that added up to over 40, actually 41, in 2025, a significant increase compared to 2024. Also as noted, you know, last year alone, we signed a record 10 PPQ contracts, with total PPQ project now at 18. I mentioned that, you know, we signed a record 70 ICMC in 2025.
If you look at the comparison both in 2023 and 2024, the numbers were slightly over 50. Last year we made basically another big jump to 70. More excitingly, if we look at the breakdown of the 70 ICMCs, more than half of those are actually from the newer modalities or the XDC modalities. This includes, you know, almost 20% of the bispecifics, about 5% of the dual payloads, about 70% of the other type of conjugates, including like APCs, AOCs, etc. Among those, you know, about 10% non-oncology. Again, most of those are the XDC domains.
The you know much more diversified and also newer type of conjugates really represents you know what the industry you know is moving forward with. Also laid out a great foundation for our further service revenue down the stream. Let's also take a look at our PPQ pipeline. I mentioned we have you know 18 PPQ projects cumulatively. More than half of those are from overseas clients. Again among those five are from the MNC and biopharma. Also the 18 projects represent very diversified targets and also different type of MOAs. In terms of execution by end of last year we have successfully completed 20 PPQ components.
Again, you know, we use the term PPQ components here because for a single ADC projects there might be up to four different components that need to be validated through PPQ campaigns. You know, the message is that you know we have a great pipeline of PPQ you know projects. They represent you know very diverse targets you know MOAs. We have also had a great execution track record you know as far as up to 2025. Okay, let's also take a look at the client profile and also our market share expansion. We continue to increase clients.
That number reached over 640. Among those, you know, 14 of the 20 top pharmas are our clients. The revenue from the pharma is just below 1/3, basically 32% in 2025. That obviously is an important part of our business. We also continue to expand market share. If you look at the lower left, you know, last 2024, our market share jumped to 21.7%. In 2025, based on our own estimate, we continue to expand to 24%.
We obviously already are the clear number one in terms of, you know, CMC projects as well as IND approvals. In 2025, more importantly, we continue to empower and enable global clients, many biotechs, in terms of the, you know, major deals as well as our licensing. You know, for deals above $1 billion, you know, basically, 50% of the deal companies are our clients. Basically every one of two, you know, if you hear or see M&A deals, those are above $1 billion, basically every one of two are our clients. Also in terms of deal value above $1 billion, you know, our clients' deals represent over 65%.
This continue to be important, you know, contribution that we make to biotechs, you know, to the industry. Next slide. As a CRDMO, we continue to stay at the forefront of the industry in terms of XDCs, ADCs, XDCs and, you know, a variety of different combinations of payload linkers. To that end, by 2025, our team have helped to make over 19,000, you know, all sort of different bioconjugate molecules. Our total discovery stage projects just over 1,000 CMC stage at 252.
If you look at the ADC versus XDCs, we can see that, you know, for CMC stage, just over 10% are the XDC domains. At the discovery stage, that proportion is quite a bit higher, over 25%. Those represents again, you know, where the industry is potentially moving. That includes a lot of the novel conjugates including peptide conjugates, optical conjugates, Fc conjugates, antibody-chelator conjugates, and also, you know, even antiviral conjugates.
The next slide is you know one of my favorite and we continue to track each year you know how many bioconjugate molecules our team make and you know what are the basically breakdowns of those you know thousands of different bioconjugate molecules. In 2025 alone you know our team made over 5,600 bioconjugate molecules. A large proportion you know slightly over 60% are the ADCs. Obviously biggest is the regular ADCs but also emerging in terms of bispecific ADCs dual-payload ADCs you know with you know rapidly increasing number. Also more interestingly if we look at the XDC domains right?
About 40% are the XDC components domains. Among those, the biggest ones are still the degrader conjugates, antibody-oligonucleotide conjugates, and antibody-peptide conjugates. Those three were also the top three in 2024. It remains to be the most explored areas in terms of XDC domains. Again, by looking at this, you know, we can actually tell, you know, where the industry is going and how the field evolves over time. Next slide.
I mentioned that we make a lot of breakthroughs in 2025 in terms of innovation and also, you know, how we continue to add value through those innovation to our clients as well as to XDC. Last year we continued to make progress in the WuXiDARx evolution. We started with DAR4 a few years ago and over the past two years we expanded DAR to the DAR1, DAR2 and DAR6. That's why we now use the term WuXiDARx. The important distinction between our technology and other in the industry is that we focus mainly on the cysteine-based conjugation.
That basically is using the native cysteine site of the antibody so that you don't need to do any engineering. That is especially the new platform of DAR1 and DAR2 is important for newer modalities like AOCs and APCs. We also continue to you know expand the usage of the new novel connector called X-LinC that helps to stabilize the monomer instability that typically faced with a cysteine-based conjugation. Also last year we made a great progress in our linker payload innovation formally introducing the WuXiTecan-1 and WuXiTecan-2. Those you know innovative payload linkers help our clients to potentially develop the best-in-class ADCs.
We have actually able to monetize our proprietary technology, which I will share a little bit later. Next slide. Let me go over the DARx platform and the application of that first. I mentioned that we, you know, iterate from DAR4 to now include, you know, DAR1, DAR2, also DAR6. Particularly the DAR1 and DAR2's important technologies for developing AOCs and APCs, because pretty much all the AOCs and APCs only need a DAR of 1 or 2. Again, the important benefit of this technology platform is that we don't need to do any antibody engineering.
Basically, you can easily develop the DAR1 and DAR2 with a similar site-specific conjugation. With the DARx technology, you know, with our two-step conjugation approach, we have also enabled clients to build the dual-payload ADCs, which is another important development trend of the industry. This platform can support, you know, 4+4 format, 4+2 format, or 6+2 formats. Basically different combinations of the two payloads.
Again, I wanted to, you know, emphasize that, you know, this is without a need to do any antibody engineering, and enable the use of already existing payloads without any modification, because we use a two-step conjugation approach to add the two payloads in two different steps. So this is easily, basically adopted based on the already existing payloads. I mentioned also important progress in the payload linker innovation. So we introduced the Tecan-1 and Tecan-2 in 2025. Both of them help to improve the efficacy as well as also improve on the safety, the tolerance.
Essentially, you know, allow clients to expand on the therapeutic index, which is ultimately what's the most important for ADCs. We share some of the information on actually WuXiTecan-2 here. This WuXiTecan-2 particularly focusing on improving the hydrophilicity. Basically optimization of the linker component of the linker-payload. It allow us to demonstrate a superior efficacy as well as also great tolerance in the monkey study.
Also, with the WuXiTecan-2, we have a very good preclinical data on the dual payload involving the use of MMAE and also our WuXiTecan-2, basically showing both improvements on efficacy as well as tolerability in vivo. Again, those innovations you know help clients to develop potential best-in-class ADCs and also help us to actually monetize you know from the technology. Next slide, basically, it's a great example of how you know we basically add value to client and also monetize ours based on our technology. Earlier this year, we announced a deal with Earendil Labs.
Basically, our licensing of our WuXiTecan-2 technology to Earendil Labs. Earendil Labs is an AI-powered biotech, you know, specializing in, you know, ADC as well as other, you know, biologics innovations. The deal is valued at $885 million. This is first of our, you know, type of new approach for innovation. Also the first out-licensing deal based on the WuXiTecan-2. It obviously also will add value in terms of continue to expand our service, you know, our service scope to CMC further down the road.
Also with the innovation of the linker payload, as well as the continuing progress of our linker payload business, we actually see a lot of opportunities in terms of linker payload CMC and future commercial manufacturing. As a result, we decided to make a major investment in the linker payload commercial supply capacity build-up. That's the investment in the Jiangyin site. A very large scale dedicated facility for commercial manufacturing of, you know, linker payloads. Next slide. Also wanted to update our capacity and our global networks. We continue to expand in China as well as, you know, in Singapore and potentially other overseas sites.
In China, in addition to WuXi and Shanghai, as mentioned, we have an acquisition in Hefei for peptide and oligonucleotide, and then a major investment in Jiangyin for commercial scale payload linker manufacturing. As you are aware, we also announced an acquisition in early January for another CDMO based in Suzhou called BioDlink, which basically has also more of a all-in-one capability including mAb conjugation and DP manufacturing. Let's go over some of the sites in terms of the current status. The first is the WuXi city site. This is our largest manufacturing base. We what we call the our manufacturing.
In WuXi site, we currently have three conjugation facilities, three drug product facilities in operation. Also, two mAb facilities and one linker-payload facility, as well as a labeling packaging center. This is a very large and also still pretty much globally the only site that can do all four of the component manufacturing for clinical as well as for commercial. In WuXi city site, we also continue to expand, particularly, for drug products. We're adding the DP5 and DP6. Both are very large scale DP capacities. Those will be released in 2027 and also 2028, respectively.
I mentioned Singapore, which is, you know, a cornerstone of our commercial manufacturing, especially outside of China. We continue to make great progress for the Singapore site. After we achieved the mechanical completion in June of 2025, the team has been focusing on commissioning and, you know, potential release of the facility, the site, in GMP status. That is well on target. Later this year, we will start manufacturing, you know, for global client projects. The next is the Jiangyin site.
I mentioned that because of what we see as accelerated growth opportunities for payload-linker business and also in combination with our, you know, continued innovation in linker-payload, we see that this particular part of the business will grow faster than our overall XDC business in the next few years. That's why we are investing in a very large scale commercial site for linker-payload, which will have, you know, more than fivefold of the current capacity in WuXi city site. This will also allow us to manufacture larger scales for in the XDC domain of the payload-linkers, for example, the ADCs, peptides, et cetera.
This is another potential, you know, upside of the business, contributing from the peptide linker part of the overall business in the next few years. Next slide. In addition to organic growth, organic expansions in different sites, we have also made very strategic acquisitions in the past year or so. This includes a small acquisition in Hefei for peptides and oligonucleotides. And also, more importantly, in recent months, we made the announcement to acquire BioDlink, another, you know, basically, top three CDMO for ADCs in China.
BioDlink actually has well-established capacity over 50,000 sq m of construction and also full capability from the mAb intermediate to conjugation drug substance and drug products. Next slide. BioDlink acquisition is not just for capacity, obviously, which is an important part of the benefit. Also wanted to share that, you know, BioDlink has a well-established customer base and also a quite diverse and large portfolio of the projects, including multiple in the pre-BLA stage, basically PPQ or later stage, and also one approved ADC products already for China market.
We are excited to you know continue to see synergies in client base in projects as well as also in technologies. Those are basically updates in terms of business as well as operational achievements in 2025. Next, I will turn to Michael to share the financial results you know with everyone.
Sure. Thanks, Jimmy. Yeah, if you look at the slides like Jimmy mentioned at the beginning of our presentation, we can see that the XDC continues its strong growth momentum in the past two years. In 2025, we also achieved very exciting results. So you can see that our top line revenue just like what we you know communicated or announced in our profit alert, our top line revenue grew by 46.7% and it reached around RMB 6 billion. Our gross profit also grew very strong and achieved a 72.5% growth rate and reached around RMB 2 billion.
In addition to that, our gross profit margin also increased, you know, from 30.6%- 36% in 2025. Besides those, you know, we can see that, you know, the ADC and XDC both of those modalities grew very strongly along with our top-line growth. You can see that, similar to 2024, ADC accounts for around 90% of our overall revenue, and XDC accounts for around 7% of our overall revenue. Lastly, if you look at our adjusted net profit, it also achieved outstanding growth with a growth rate of 69.9%, you know, around 70% growth in 2025.
Our adjusted net profit reached around RMB 1.6 billion. In addition to that, our adjusted net profit margin also increased from 22.6% in 2024 to 26.2% in 2025. Next slide. In terms of the revenue breakdown, as you can see that, you know, similar to 2024 and 2023, our pre-R&D portfolio accounts for 42% of our overall revenue and our, you know, post-R&D portfolio accounts for 52% of our overall revenue. In terms of geographic breakdown, you know, as you can see that there was the strong momentum of our licensing new co and M&A activities, the revenue from overseas, in particular in U.S., increased significantly.
You know, it's contribute 51% of our overall revenue in 2025. Collectively, I think that the North America and Europe accounts for and the rest of the world accounts for 85% of the total revenue in 2025. I think one thing I want to mention is that if you look at the, you know, our revenue breakdown by project status and our revenue breakdown by region, if you believe that the XDC is a proxy of, you know, ADC, R&D development, you will, you know, you can see actually, you know, the growth momentum of ADC and XDC continues.
Because if you look, in China, a lot of early-stage projects are continuing to emerge. That's why, you know, China's revenue accounts for 15% of the overall revenue, despite, you know, a lot of those projects are early-stage or small science projects. In addition to this, you can see that, you know, once those MNC or U.S. companies out-license the project from China, they quickly launch the multiple trials and also invest a lot of money to push through the clinical trials. As a result, you know, it accounts for a significant portion of the revenue.
All of those tells you that, you know, the MNC firm, MNC pharmas or the biotech or biopharmas in U.S. are, you know, focusing on ADC space. I believe that most of those pharmas are, you know, treating ADC as a core modality in their future pipeline development. Next slide. We'll look at the top-line margins as well. Like what I mentioned before, our gross margin, gross profit margin continued to increase in the past couple years. From 2023, we only have 26.3%, and now 2024 or 2025, our gross profit margin reached 36%.
All of those is, you know, attributable to, you know, our continuous improving utilization rate of the existing facilities, and also our quickly, you know, ramp up of the new production lines, such as DP3, which became operational in mid-2025. We, you know, thanks for the efforts of our, you know, colleagues. We continue to enhance our operation efficiencies. Also for the adjusted net profit, we continue to, you know, put a very stringent or very close control on the SG&A. We continue to improve, you know, our productivity and the efficiencies.
As a result, our adjusted net profit margin also continuously increased from 14.9% in 2023 to 26.2% in 2025. You can see that our adjusted profit margin almost doubled, you know, from 2023- 2025. Next slide. If you look at the funnel, you can see that the total backlog, like Jimmy mentioned, you know, previously, by the end of 2025, our outstanding backlog reached $1.5 billion, which grew 50.3% year-over-year compared with that, you know, of 2024.
In addition to this, I think that our newly signed contract value in 2025 increased by 41% year-over-year and reached around $1.3 billion. Next slide. We talk about CapEx. As you can see from the chart on the left-hand side, we almost maintained a pace of, you know, bringing new facilities online and operational each year, right? In addition to that we'll continue to invest significantly both domestically and overseas. We updated our CapEx investment plan. I think that from 2026- 2030, we plan to commit, you know, additional RMB 8 billion CapEx.
You know, including mainly for the BioDlink acquisition and also the construction of linker-payload facilities, as Jimmy mentioned, at the Jiangyin site, which we'll target to launch by late 2027 or early 2028. Also, we are continuously looking for opportunities to expand overseas. As you can see on the chart on the right-hand side, in 2025, we committed RMB 1.2 billion for the CapEx. In 2026, if we include BioDlink acquisition, we actually plan to invest RMB 3.1 billion. Taking out, you know, BioDlink acquisition, we will invest another, you know, RMB 1.4 billion for, you know, organic growth.
Despite all those, you know, significant CapEx investment plans, I think by the end of 2025, we actually have, you know, a cash position of RMB 7.5 billion. Which, you know, on top of that, we have, you know, positive cash inflow from our operations. We believe that all those provide a very strong support for, you know, capital investment, CapEx investment plan in the future. With all those being said, I will transfer back to Jimmy to talk about future outlook and the key takeaways.
Okay. Thank you, Michael. Yeah, let's come back to look at the outlook for the next few years. Obviously, you know, one part of the business that's important for the next few years' growth is the commercial opportunity and commercial manufacturing. To that end, I'd like to share you know, some visibility based on our own you know, pipeline analysis, our funnel analysis. The next slide basically shows you know, our sort of a forecast in terms of you know, what's to come in terms of commercial projects in the next few years, right? Starting in 2026 and then to 2027 and 2028.
We break it down to modalities, and the various new capacities to support late-stage and commercial manufacturing and also ultimately the M-stage projects, including the PPQ components, and also the BLA submissions, which are the two most critical milestones, you know, for actual commercial manufacturing. In terms of modalities, obviously the 2026 and perhaps also 2027 and 2028, we see another major wave of ADC products going to commercial. More and more BLAs, PPQs, you know, will be completed, submitted for commercial approval. We also start to see the other different modalities getting to late stage.
Especially by 2028, we envision that, you know, including bispecific ADCs, dual-payload ADCs, as well as antibody-oligonucleotide conjugates and antibody-peptide conjugates, you know, majority of those will start to get to the PPQ and commercial BLA submission stages. To support those expanding commercial pipeline, you know, we have a fully mature WuXi site. Singapore site will start operation this year. With the acquisition of BioDlink in Suzhou, we are also adding another site, which already begun commercial manufacturing of a China-approved ADC in 2025. As noted, our larger scale linker-payload dedicated facility in Jiangyin will come online by end of 2027, early 2028.
We continue to look to expand to additional sites outside of China, which includes, for example, the U.S. site, that we intend to make announcement later this year. Those will provide, you know, more capacity to ensure, you know, sufficient manufacturing capacity for various commercial projects. We also continue to track the number of PPQ components that we execute successfully. I mentioned earlier that by 2025, we have completed 20 PPQ component manufacturing. We expect to add another, at least another 10 PPQ, this year, and then, perhaps, 15 PPQ or more, in the next few years. 2026 will be a year of multiple BLA submissions to the U.S. FDA as well as to China NMPA.
With the next wave of ADC portfolios to come to commercial stage, we expect to see more and more of those BLA submissions in the next few years. Those basically provides you know good visibility for us to target you know 20% of the revenue coming from end projects and also 20% of the revenue coming from the XDC domains by 2030. Next slide. Basically that if you add that up and then also obviously with our already global leading discovery service and development business we basically are seeing you know all three of the RDM cylinders running you know in full speed in the next few years.
That gave us a lot of confidence to maintain our CAGR between 30%-35% in the next few years, which, you know, will be above the industry average. You know, it will include you know, a lot of the what we call the second wave of growth you know, from the bispecific dual-payloads, AOCs, APCs, et cetera. Last page. Let's go to the key take-home messages, you know, for 2025. Obviously, we continue to see very strong growth momentum for the ADC and XDC industry. Also for 2026, BioDlink post-acquisition integration will bring synergies to our operation to our capacity.
We also expect to capture additional value added you know synergies going forward. I mentioned that you know our innovation continued to empower XDC you know XDC modalities of the bioconjugates. We are seeing more and more bispecific ADCs, dual-payload ADCs, AOCs, APCs and other type of you know XDC modalities. Those are already reflected in the 70 ICMC projects we signed in 2025, and we expect to see the continuation of those trend in 2026. 2025 was a year of breakthrough for our innovation especially for linker-payload. We made our licensing deal earlier this year you know for the first time.
This will be the upside of our current forecast, if we see any additional such deals in our licensing or potentially in other type of, you know, partnerships that leverage our innovative linker payloads. Obviously, Singapore coming online for GMP release and GMP manufacturing later this year will help to bring additional backlog, especially for later stage and commercial manufacturing. That's part of this year's priority, which is to continue to build backlog for Singapore for 2027 and 2028. Last but not least, you know, we feel very excited about our commercial opportunities in terms of the CMO part of our business.
We have everything lined up to capture the next wave of the ADC approvals, as well as also to help clients to advance the XDC modalities to later stage and commercialization. With that, I'd like to thank everyone again and hope that you can see that you know we continue to make great contributions to the industry and that basically help us to deliver another very strong year of 2025 and also a lot of opportunities for 2026 ahead. That concludes the presentation and we are open for questions.
Yeah. Thank you, Jimmy and Michael. Let's move to the next chapter for the Q&A session. All the investors and analysts, do you have any questions, please feel free to raise up your hand and we will unmute you. The first question is coming from MS team. Morgan Stanley, Lawrence, please.
Great. Thank you for the opportunity to ask questions. Congrats to management for a fantastic 2025. How should we think about 2026 revenue and earnings growth given a strong increase in the backlog number? Also we have the consolidation of BioDlink, probably from April, and also the ramp-up of the Singapore facility in the second half of this year, which-
potentially dilute margins. Basically, what's the outlook for 2026? Thank you.
Yeah, let me answer that question. I think for 2026, on a consolidated basis, if we look at the you know CDMO revenues, the reason why I'm saying that, because you know obviously that the BioDlink has a biosimilar business in 2025, which they already started to terminate that business in 2025. So, if we look at the only CDMO revenues on a consolidated basis, we still believe that you know XDC as a group will be able to you know maintain a growth rate around 35% for the top line.
Obviously, the exact growth rate depends on where the exchange rate sits at the end because a significant portion of our income is coming from U.S. dollar, but the functional currency on the reporting RMB. The exchange rate does have an impact, but that's totally non-operational. In a nutshell, I think that the XDC as a group on consolidated basis are still very confident to maintain at least the 35% growth for the revenue.
In terms of the margin, I think you asked about the margin. I think that in 2026, you know, there's a lot of work for us to do in terms of the Singapore ramp up and also BioDlink integration. We haven't started BioDlink integration yet because the acquisition will formally complete by March 27th. As a result, it's still too early for us to say exactly, you know, how much synergy and how much cost we will be able to reduce at this moment.
I think that we set, actually, a target, you know, to maintain at least the gross profit margin at the same level as 2020-2025. Yeah.
Thanks a lot. Should we expect any IP income in 2026? Obviously, you had a deal with an AI-driven drug development company last month. Should we expect any licensing income in the near term?
I would say, you know, at least our guidance or our forecast does include that part. As you can understand, the licensing agreement actually doesn't come regularly, so it's very difficult for us to forecast. Also, the milestone for the existing deal we signed also depends on, you know, the progress of our partners. In our guidance, we don't actually factor in any of those. Obviously, with our continuous investment in R&D, I think that, you know, we have a better chance to do more licensing deal in the future. Currently, I think that they're still at the nascent stage.
I don't think that, you know, investors should put a significant weight on the licensing income in the near term.
Yeah. Basically, if it happens, you know, it would be the upside, you know, of whatever current forecast.
Okay.
Okay.
Thank you. I just have one last question on the backlog. The current backlog number is $1.5 billion, and $1.3 billion of that is new orders. You know, maybe we can infer that a big part of the backlog is early-stage projects. In relation to your long-term CAGR guidance of 30%-35%, can we assume, like, most of that is driven by R&D instead of. Basically, my question, when is the commercial part going to ramp up significantly, given your final goal of 20% revenue from manufacturing?
Yeah. I think that this really correlates with the development stage of ADC drugs. I think that you know, at this stage, you will see that our you know, new signed contract value are quite close to our outstanding backlog because you know, most of the contracts we had are still in either preclinical stage or clinical stage. The delivery timelines journey from 6 months- 12 months or 16 months you know, maximum.
I think along with the development stage, you know, the change of the development stage of all those portfolios, once they reach commercialization stage, usually the contract is, you know, the delivery times are longer and it's, like, more repetitive. It's more of a repetitive each year, okay? I would imagine, you know, in a couple years' time, you know, the structure of our backlog will change, you know, slightly, gradually, you know, as we have more commercialized M stage projects. It's very difficult for us to say at this moment because, you know, most of the, you know, the portfolio.
Most of the pipelines on our portfolio are still in clinical stage, so we simply haven't reached such a status yet, you know, with a significant portion of the contract coming from M stage.
Well, just to also add a comment to that. Basically, even though our backlog newly signed contract amounts are quite close, but we are starting to see basically, for example, more PPQ contract amounts, right? Those will take a little bit longer to execute. We also count the PPQ as part of our commercial stage contracts, right? That is you know, beginning to build up and probably will be quite a bit more substantial in 2026 and going forward.
Okay.
Thank you very much.
Thank you, Lawrence. Next question is coming from HSBC, Linda Team. Linda, or Eve, please go ahead. Yeah, please unmute. Okay, thank you.
Thank you. Thank you, team, and for the opportunity. I would just like to have two questions on behalf of our Analyst, Linda. The first question is about global ADC supply. We understand that our acquisition of BioDlink to expand its ready-to-use capacity and is already establishing overseas operations, including ramping up the capacity in Singapore starting in this year. We also see that overseas peers, such as those in South Korea and Japan, are also accelerating their capacity expansion beyond next year. Has the company considered whether the industry can absorb this new capacity? Some more color on the competitive landscape. The second question is on raw materials.
We observed that the escalating situation in the Middle East has catalyzed the rise in oil-related prices, and will this have any impact on the cost of our antibody payload-linker this year? Thank you.
Maybe a short answer to the second question first. You know, obviously, the Middle East situation is still quite new and, you know, still evolving. So at this moment, we have not seen impact on the raw material pricing yet. But also, if we look at, you know, the Ukraine-Russia war in the past couple years, that has not had any material impact on the material pricing. Also, materials are basically pass-throughs to our clients, so we don't actually make profit out of those. So, you know, if the price rises, those will be basically directly pass-through to clients. So that's on the second question.
On the first question, you mentioned the potential new capacities coming from, for example, Samsung or Fuji. If you look into the details, you know, first of all, they don't have all of the pieces ready yet. I think, you know, the earliest probably is 2027. Also, the capacity that you know, you see is actually quite small in terms of, you know, what they have in active plan.
We still see the global supply situation remains relatively tight in the next few years, especially considering that the next wave of ADCs you know are already in the later stage and getting to commercial approval stages in the next few years. I think the demand actually is stronger than what the capacity can increase. That is also one of the important reason that we continue to you know make very proactive and aggressive plans to expand on our capacity including you know the acquisition of BioDlink even though we have a Singapore site you know ready this year.
You know, we continue to see that. Also, this is, you know, also reflected by our conversation, you know, with many clients, you know, on an ongoing basis.
Thank you.
Okay, thank you. The next question is coming from Jefferies' Cui Cui team. Davey? Please go ahead, Davey.
Yep. Can you hear me?
Yes.
Yes.
Yeah, thanks for taking my question. I will ask two questions on behalf of Cui Cui. First one is about BioDlink. We know after the acquisition, can you share with us more like a plan about how do you deal with their biosimilar business as well as we see they have some backlogs on hand. How do you deal with that and combine and merge in your backlog? The second question is about AI drug discovery because we see AI has been used in many early-stage drug discovery screening, different process. Basically, can you share with us some like good examples or your AI applications in the early-stage drug discovery? Thank you.
Yeah, let me answer the first question. In terms of the BioDlink's biosimilar business, like what I mentioned before, you know, they already started to terminate that business, you know, second half last year. You know, there will be some residual business in 2026, but it's very minimum. That's first thing. Second is that regarding their existing contracts, of course we need to honor those contracts. We will first fulfill those contracts, you know, according to their agreement, and then we will start to sign new contracts. That's pretty much the plan.
In terms of the AI drug discovery, I think that you know it's a very you know exciting area, and also it's very promising area as well. I think that all the efforts and activities are still in early stage. We are also closely monitoring the development of this area. You know I think that we are you know pushing through the AI application within our organization as well. For the AI drug discovery, like what I said, you know this is still early and we are continuously monitoring.
If you know it turns out to be something that we can leverage our experience and expertise, then I think that it will work. At this moment, it's still too early for us to say anything. Yeah.
Thank you. Thank you.
Okay. Thanks, Davey. Due to the time constraints, maybe we are taking the last question. It's from Goldman [inaudible] team. Chris, please go ahead.
Sure. Thank you, [inaudible] for taking my questions. This is Chris from [inaudible] team. So just to have a follow-up question on the Singapore site, we are expecting to see the GMP this year. Can you update the client contracts secured for the site, and also the revenue contribution that we expected for this year and 2027? Thank you.
Chris, let me take on this. Our current forecast for Singapore is a minimum revenue contribution in 2026, because you know GMP release of the site is you know in the next few months. Clients will need to make a GMP audit after it's released. Actual production, any production actually, will be later in the second half. Also, as a brand new site, our focus is to engage clients to visit and evaluate, with the goal of basically building up a significant backlog in 2026, but not so much in terms of actual execution.
That's kind of the overall you know planning in terms of the pace for Singapore.
Okay, thank you. That's very clear.
Okay, thank you. Let me also turn the phone to Dr. Jimmy Li again to give us the closing remark.
Okay. Again, thank you everyone for joining the earnings call. As you can see that, you know, we continue to execute and continue to deliver a very strong performance in 2025. We made a lot of, you know, advancements in terms of innovation.
Also, in terms of you know, moving a variety of different XDC domain projects into the CMC clinical stage. We've also continued to feel very excited about our progress in commercial manufacturing side, in terms of signing a record number of PPQ contracts. 2026, I think we'll continue to have quite a few additional catalysts that will be important for our growth in the next few years, including innovation and also you know, value creation from those innovations. For example by the recent deal with you know, Earendil Labs. And our peptide linker business also will grow faster than the average or than the overall group company.
As you know, accordingly, we are expanding the Jiangyin site dedicated for linker-payload commercial capacity. We have made a couple strategic acquisitions, which will add immediate capacity or capability to our network. We feel excited that you know, we'll start to see more synergies also from operations and also technologies going forward. Last but not least, I think 2026 will see an important new milestone in terms of multiple BLA submissions from our clients to both the FDA as well as to China NMPA. This will lay a solid foundation for our commercial manufacturing and commercial revenue, you know, a few years down the road.
Those actually you know give us a lot of confidence in terms of our overall targeted growth you know for the next few years. That's why we feel very comfortable foreseeing that we maintain the CAGR of 30%-35% in the next few years. Again you know thank you for joining and we look forward to sharing more updates with you going forward.
Okay. Thank you, Jimmy and Michael. Thanks for everyone's participation and also your interest in the WuXi XDC. That concludes our earnings call today. Thank you. Have a nice day.