BEIJING -- The National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) on Monday launched the Private Enterprise Innovation and Development Joint Fund, which aims to empower private companies to officially participate in national basic research.

Under the fund's framework, private enterprises will identify critical research challenges based on their specific innovation needs and the joint fund will sponsor top researchers nationwide to tackle these defined problems.

NSFC Director Dou Xiankang stated that the fund aims to leverage the NSFC's guiding role, encouraging innovation-driven private enterprises to boost their investment in foundational research.

The initiative seeks to concentrate China's leading scientific resources on core scientific issues within key technological fields. It will focus on basic and applied basic research tightly aligned with urgent national economic and social development needs. This approach is designed to foster deep integration between technological and industrial innovation, energize private sector innovation, and inject fresh momentum into China's innovation-driven development strategy.

The inaugural partners in the fund are four major pharmaceutical firms: Hengrui Pharmaceuticals, Mindray Bio-Medical, Singclean Medical, and Qilu Pharmaceutical.

The NSFC intends to maximize the fund's steering function, broadly attracting high-caliber scientific talent across society to advance basic research in the medical field and collectively push the boundaries of independent innovation.