Huadong Medicine continued to appealed after losing the first instance. On the evening of February 26, according to the announcement of Jolly Pharmaceutical that due to the patent dispute involving Bailin, the plaintiff, Hangzhou Zhongmei Huadong Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd had formally appealed to the Supreme People's Court after all its claims were dismissed in the first-instance judgment. The Supreme People's Court has accepted the case but has not yet held a hearing.

The patent involved in this case is titled "Enzyme, gene and application of adenosine monophosphate synthesized by Hirsutella sinensis" with patent number ZL201210175221.3, and is jointly owned by Zhongmei Huadong and Zhejiang University of Technology.

What Huadong Medicine accused is that adenosine kinase, genes, and adenine nucleotides protected by the patent were detected in Bailin tablets produced and sold by Zhufeng Pharmaceutical. Therefore, Huadong Medicine believes that the raw material used by Zhufeng Pharmaceutical to Fermented Cordyceps Sinensis Powder comes from Zhufeng Raw Materials, and the strain used to produce this mycelium powder is Hirsutella sinensis, and that the production process used the method protected by the patent in question.

Jolly Pharmaceutical, however, argues that it had conducted thorough due diligence before acquiring Zhufeng Pharmaceutical. Zhufeng Raw Materials had already obtained a drug registration approval for Fermented Cordyceps Sinensis Powder in 2010, with its production and sales activities comply with national regulations.

For this lawsuit, Jolly Pharmaceutical stated that the second instance hearing has not yet been held, and the final judgment is remains uncertain, which means that is currently unable to estimate the impact on the company's profit for the period or future.

In 2014, Jolly Pharmaceutical acquired a 51% stake in Zhufeng Pharmaceutical for 150 million yuan, and then in 2018, it purchased an additional 30% stake for 120 million yuan, thus realizing its total controlling stake of 81% in Zhufeng Pharmaceutical. The main product of Zhufeng Pharmaceutical is Bailin tablets. Therefore, the situation where Bailin market is monopolized by Huadong Medicine changed.

Huadong Medicine chose to take legal action and filed a lawsuit against Zhufeng Pharmaceutical, a subsidiary of Jolly Pharmaceutical as a response to sharing the market for its former exclusive core product with other companies.

What Huadong Medicine has requested was that the defendant cease production and sales of the raw materials and finished products for Bailin tablets, and pay related compensation of approximately 110 million yuan. The raw materials for Bailin tablets are also that for Bailin capsules, Huadong Medicine obviously aims to suppress Jolly Pharmaceutical 's approved Bailin capsules.

However, on December 15 last year, Huadong Medicine stated that Hangzhou Zhongmei Huadong, its wholly-owned subsidiary, had received a civil judgment from the Zhejiang Provincial Higher People's Court. In the dispute between Hangzhou Zhongmei Huadong and Zhufeng Pharmaceutical, a subsidiary of Jolly Pharmaceutical, regarding the invention patent right of Fermented Cordyceps Sinensis Powder, after two public hearings in April and June 2024, the court rejected all of Zhongmei Huadong’s claims. The amount involved in the case was approximately RMB 111.39 million.

On January 7th in 2026, Jolly Pharmaceutical announced its receiving of the Drug Registration Certificate for Bailin Capsules issued by the National Medical Products Administration, which means that for this product with annual sales of several billion yuan, the competition between Jolly Pharmaceutical and Huadong Medicine, will further intensify.

From IP Forefront

February 27th, 2026