Daiichi Sankyo has built one of the pharmaceutical industry’s most productive antibody-drug conjugate platforms. Enhertu has changed treatment across several HER2-expressing cancers. Datroway has extended the company’s reach into TROP2-directed therapy. A further group of clinical candidates is moving through solid tumours and haematological malignancies. The company is now entering a more demanding strategic phase. That, of course, translates into great opportunity for the right partners.
Creating Daiichi Sankyo’s successful ADC platform was a monumental scientific achievement. Converting it into a large, sustainable oncology business continues to be work in progress. They are now extending their platform into new indications, identifying the patients most likely to benefit, managing resistance, increasing manufacturing capacity, protecting global supply and improving the speed of clinical development. They are also developing new ADC designs while identifying the therapeutic platforms that can sustain growth as the current DXd portfolio matures.
Daiichi Sankyo’s FY2026–FY2030 business plan reads like crystal clear ambition. The company aims to generate more than ¥2.3 trillion in oncology revenue by 2030 and become one of the world’s five largest oncology companies by 2035. It aims to reach more than 700,000 new patients annually by 2035. The planning period is intended to expand the oncology business, identify the next Breakthrough Generating Technologies and strengthen the organisation required to support global execution.
These plans create significant opportunities for companies providing oncology research, biomarkers, diagnostics, clinical services, manufacturing technologies, data analysis, translational models and new therapeutic platforms.
Please remember there’s no open invitation for every supplier with an oncology capability.
Daiichi Sankyo already has extensive internal expertise and major global alliances. Your company must solve a specific problem inside its strategy to be relevant. Here’s your homework: Understanding where the pressure is increasing, which organisation owns the decision and why your capability deserves attention now.
How DXd Became Their Strategic Platform
An ADC joins a tumour-targeting antibody with a potent therapeutic payload. The antibody directs the medicine towards cells expressing the selected antigen. Following internalisation, the linker releases the payload, which damages or kills the targeted and nearby cells.
The basic description conceals considerable scientific and manufacturing complexity.
The target must be sufficiently prevalent in the intended patient population. Expression on healthy tissue must remain manageable. The antibody must bind effectively and undergo suitable internalisation. The linker must remain stable in circulation, then release the payload under the correct conditions. The payload must provide sufficient potency without creating unacceptable systemic toxicity.
The complete molecule must also be manufacturable, stable and consistent.
Daiichi Sankyo’s DXd technology combines a monoclonal antibody with an exatecan-derived topoisomerase I inhibitor payload through tetrapeptide-based cleavable linkers. The design supports a relatively high drug-to-antibody ratio and a payload capable of exerting a bystander effect after release. These characteristics have helped the company treat tumours with heterogeneous antigen expression and reach patient groups beyond those served by earlier ADC generations.
Daiichi Sankyo currently has eight ADCs in clinical development. Seven use its DXd technology. The portfolio includes programmes directed towards HER2, TROP2, HER3, B7-H3, CDH6, TA-MUC1 and CD37. The CD37-directed DS3790 became the company’s first DXd ADC to enter clinical development for a haematological malignancy.
Daiichi Sankyo is managing a family of related products with different targets, tumour settings, patient populations, safety profiles and commercial requirements.
That distinction matters to your strategy.
Daiichi Sankyo isn’t a company searching broadly for ADC competence. They are a company with deep ADC expertise that needs selected external capabilities to expand, refine and industrialise their established technology base.
The First Priority Is to Expand the Current Franchise
Enhertu and Datroway form the commercial front of Daiichi Sankyo’s ADC strategy.
Enhertu has established the therapeutic potential of targeting HER2 across different cancers and levels of target expression. Its development has extended beyond traditional HER2-positive disease into patient groups previously described through broader biomarker categories. Datroway is adding a TROP2-directed programme across breast and lung cancers.
Daiichi Sankyo plans to secure more than 20 new indications across five medicines by 2030. The aim is to increase the number of eligible patients through new tumour types, earlier treatment lines, combination regimens and more precise patient selection.
Each indication creates a chain of scientific and operational needs.
The correct patients must be found. Tumour samples must be collected, processed and analysed. Biomarker assays must perform consistently across study sites and countries. Pathologists need reproducible interpretation standards. Clinical sites must understand the protocol and compete successfully for eligible patients. Evidence must support regulatory approval, reimbursement and routine use.
This creates opportunities for diagnostics companies, laboratory networks, pathology specialists, clinical research providers and data companies. However, you need to define your contribution clearly.
- Can you identify patients whose tumours express a target at heterogeneous or relatively low levels?
- Can your assay reduce ambiguity in patient selection?
- Can your laboratory network return results quickly enough to affect trial enrolment?
- Can your digital pathology system standardise interpretation across several countries?
- Can your technology detect emerging resistance before radiological progression?
- Can your evidence platform show how an ADC performs in routine clinical practice?
Precision opens commercial doors. Broad claims will not.
Patient Identification Will Become More Difficult
The earliest ADC programmes often focused on patient populations with clear and relatively high target expression. Expansion into wider populations makes patient selection more complex. A tumour antigen is rarely expressed uniformly across every cell, lesion and stage of disease. Expression may differ between a primary tumour and a metastasis. It may change after treatment. A tissue sample never represents the full biology of the disease.
The relevance of a target also depends on more than its presence. Internalisation, intracellular trafficking, payload sensitivity and the surrounding tumour microenvironment can influence response. Daiichi Sankyo’s expansion strategy therefore creates demand for better biological characterisation.
Digital pathology companies may help quantify expression and heterogeneity more consistently than conventional visual scoring. Spatial biology can show how target expression relates to immune cells, stromal tissue and resistant subclones. Liquid-biopsy technologies may support longitudinal monitoring when repeated tissue biopsies are impractical. Proteomic and transcriptomic methods may identify biological features associated with response or failure.
The strongest opportunity will not necessarily belong to the company with the most technologically sophisticated assay. I want to suggest that the strongest opportunities with Daiichi Sankyo belong to the company that can integrate its method into existing clinical or development workflows.
Your proposal should explain which sample is needed, how much material is required, how rapidly results are produced, how the result changes a decision and how the method can be validated across laboratories.
Resistance Will Define the Next Scientific Cycle
The success of ADCs creates its own development problem. More treated patients will eventually produce more information about resistance.
Cancer cells may reduce target expression. They may alter internalisation or lysosomal processing. Drug-efflux mechanisms may remove the payload. DNA-damage response pathways may change. Resistant subclones may expand under treatment pressure. The tumour microenvironment may limit exposure or suppress the immune response These mechanisms may vary among targets, tumour types, payloads and treatment sequences.
Daiichi Sankyo needs to understand why some patients respond deeply, why others fail to respond, and why an initial response eventually disappears. Those answers will help shape new combinations, new biomarkers and future ADC designs.
This creates opportunities for companies working with:
- longitudinal tumour sampling
- circulating tumour DNA
- spatial biology
- functional genomics
- single-cell analysis
- proteomics
- patient-derived tumour models
- organoids
- resistance screens
- DNA-damage biology
- intracellular trafficking
You must connect your technology to a defined question. You may be able to distinguish target loss from payload resistance. You may identify a biomarker associated with impaired internalisation. You may provide a model that predicts which combination restores sensitivity. That is the level of specificity that makes you relevant for development decisions.
Combination Strategies Will Increase Demand for Translational Evidence
ADCs increasingly form part of combination strategies involving immunotherapies, targeted medicines, DNA-damage response agents and other treatment classes. The scientific rationale can be compelling. The practical development questions are difficult.
Which patients should receive the combination? Which agent should come first? Should they be given concurrently? What dose preserves efficacy without creating excessive toxicity? How should overlapping adverse events be monitored? Which biological marker shows that the combination is working as intended?
Daiichi Sankyo needs experimental systems capable of addressing such questions before expensive clinical programmes begin.
Companies offering tumour models, immune-competent systems, advanced imaging, pharmacodynamic biomarkers and translational toxicology may find openings. The value will depend on the degree to which the model represents the proposed clinical setting. Your company must show why your model translates and how well it does.
Manufacturing Has Become Part of the Product Strategy
ADC manufacturing is not a supporting function sitting behind the science. It is part of the strategic value of the platform. Production involves antibody manufacture, linker synthesis, payload production, conjugation, purification, analytical testing, formulation, sterile filling, packaging and temperature-controlled distribution. Each stage carries technical and regulatory risk.
Payloads require stringent containment. Conjugation affects product consistency. Drug-to-antibody ratio, free payload, aggregation, charge variants and other quality attributes can influence safety, efficacy and stability. Process changes can require extensive comparability work. A capacity limitation at one stage can be a bottleneck that restricts the entire supply chain.
Daiichi Sankyo expanded ADC manufacturing capacity during its previous planning period and revised its global supply plans as the franchise grew. The new plan calls for stronger end-to-end capabilities extending from research through manufacturing. Growth across many indications will increase pressure on this system.
A product moving into an earlier treatment line may address a far larger patient population than expected. Approval for another tumour type can change demand forecasts quickly. Additional ADCs entering late-stage development will compete for specialised capacity, technical personnel and raw materials.
This creates opportunities across high-potency chemistry, conjugation, analytical development, formulation, fill and finish, process control and supply-chain management. As you can guess: Daiichi Sankyo will assess far more than your ability to complete a technical task. They will ask whether your company can support a programme through development, registration and commercial growth.
A specialist with excellent science and insufficient capacity may become a future constraint. A large supplier with weak ADC expertise may introduce quality risk. Your company needs a credible positioning and data to support your claims.
Supply Resilience Will Receive Greater Attention
A growing ADC portfolio creates concentration risk. One specialised site may manufacture a critical payload. A single supplier may provide an essential linker intermediate. One facility may control a large share of conjugation capacity. A shortage, quality event or regulatory problem can disrupt several markets.
Daiichi Sankyo’s global alliances make continuity particularly important. Enhertu and Datroway are developed and commercialised with AstraZeneca outside Japan, while Daiichi Sankyo retains manufacturing and supply responsibility. Several other ADCs are being developed through its alliance with Merck. A failure in Daiichi Sankyo’s supply system can therefore affect shared global programmes, launch schedules and alliance economics.
Your company may create value through qualified secondary capacity, alternative raw-material sources, rapid technology transfer, supply-chain analytics or improved process monitoring. Such proposals need to show how your additional capability reduces measurable risk. Adding another supplier without a clear continuity benefit can increase complexity. Adding a supplier that reduces dependence on one facility, one geography or one process can strengthen the entire programme.
Daiichi Sankyo Is Building More Than One ADC Platform
The DXd design remains the central engine of Daiichi Sankyo’s oncology business, yet the company is also exploring ADCs with different payload concepts. DS-9606, a CLDN6-directed ADC using a modified pyrrolobenzodiazepine payload, was the first clinical programme from Daiichi Sankyo’s second ADC technology platform. However, Daiichi Sankyo discontinued its internal development in January 2026 following a strategic portfolio review. DS3610 remains in clinical development and uses an immunomodulatory payload that acts as a STING agonist. Together with continuing discovery work on new ADC concepts, these efforts demonstrate Daiichi Sankyo’s interest in extending ADC technology beyond topoisomerase I inhibition.
This may have important implications for your opportunities.
Daiichi Sankyo is not treating the ADC as a fixed structure in which only the antibody changes. It is experimenting with different payload mechanisms and different biological intentions.
A conventional cytotoxic ADC aims primarily to kill the targeted cancer cell and surroundings. An immunomodulatory ADC may use tumour targeting to deliver an immune stimulus within the tumour environment. A PBD payload may offer activity through a mechanism distinct from DXd.
These approaches create different requirements for target selection, linker behaviour, dose optimisation, toxicology and translational biomarkers. They also create openings for companies with novel payloads, release mechanisms, conjugation technologies and immune-oncology models.
A payload company should explain how its mechanism addresses a limitation of the current portfolio. A linker company could show how its chemistry affects stability, release and therapeutic index. A conjugation specialist could demonstrate an improvement in homogeneity, exposure or manufacturing control. Novelty alone will not be enough.
Daiichi Sankyo has already shown that it can invent ADC technology internally. External technology must offer a credible advantage over capabilities the company possesses or can develop itself.
New Payloads Create New Safety Questions
A new payload can address resistance or improve potency. It can also create unfamiliar toxicity.
The safety profile of an ADC may arise from target expression in healthy tissue, premature payload release, circulating metabolites, uptake by non-target cells or the intrinsic toxicity of the payload. The same molecular design may behave differently across species and tumour settings. This creates demand for better predictive toxicology.
Companies with ADC-specific in vitro systems, human-cell models, organ toxicity platforms and translational pharmacology may contribute. Their work must move beyond identifying that toxicity occurred. Daiichi Sankyo will need to understand the mechanism, exposure relationship, reversibility and clinical relevance.
Human-relevant systems may become particularly useful as animal models often fail to reproduce target biology or payload sensitivity. If you can show how your model improves and de-risks decisions concerning candidate selection, linker design, dose, monitoring or patient eligibility, you have an opportunity waiting for you.
The Search for New Targets Remains Highly Competitive
A productive ADC programme needs more than an available antibody and a tumour-associated antigen. The ideal target must support adequate tumour coverage, internalisation and therapeutic selectivity. Expression in essential healthy tissue can restrict the therapeutic window. Antigen shedding may affect exposure. Heterogeneous expression may reduce the depth of response. Target biology can differ between tumour types and treatment stages. Many attractive targets are already crowded. Daiichi Sankyo therefore needs methods that identify less obvious opportunities with strong confidence.
Companies working with tumour atlases, proteomics, spatial expression, internalisation screens and computational target assessment may be relevant. Functional studies can help distinguish a target that is merely present from one that supports effective ADC delivery. Your platform should provide evidence concerning prevalence, tumour selectivity, internalisation, heterogeneity and clinical reach. It should identify the limitations of the target as clearly as the opportunity.
Daiichi Sankyo is unlikely to value a target because an algorithm assigns it a high score. It will value a target when the complete biological case supports a differentiated therapy.
The Alliances Change How You Must Approach the Company
Daiichi Sankyo’s partnerships with AstraZeneca and Merck have provided global development capacity, commercial reach and shared investment. They have also created complex decision structures.
Enhertu and Datroway are part of the AstraZeneca collaboration. Patritumab deruxtecan, ifinatamab deruxtecan and raludotatug deruxtecan are connected to Merck.
A supplier opportunity may therefore involve several organisations.
A biomarker project may need agreement across a joint development team. A clinical service may need to satisfy global standards set through the alliance. A manufacturing decision may remain primarily with Daiichi Sankyo because of its supply responsibilities. A Japan-specific medical project may sit with Daiichi Sankyo’s domestic organisation.
You need to map out who controls the relevant budget, technical review and final decision. Approaching the wrong organisation will not be useful to anyone. Account mapping is particularly important for smaller suppliers. A large global vendor may already have relationships with each alliance partner. A specialist company needs to enter through the function that has the clearest need for its capability. Your route should follow the problem, not the prominence of the contact.
Daiichi Sankyo Is Also Preparing for the Technology After DXd
The current five-year plan describes the period through 2030 as a turning point. Daiichi Sankyo intends to expand its oncology business while identifying new Breakthrough Generating Technologies capable of supporting the company after the current DXd growth cycle. The company defines a BGT as a proprietary technology capable of generating multiple drug candidates across diseases. It wants clinically credible technologies that can produce a portfolio rather than one isolated asset. They are also developing programmes to connect research, development and manufacturing more closely so that promising programmes can progress efficiently.
Here is one of the most important openings:
Daiichi Sankyo is searching for future sources of repeatable innovation. Platform biotechs should definitely pay attention. Daiichi Sankyo will assess far more than scientific originality. They will examine the reproducibility of your platform, the quality of your data, IP, manufacturability, biomarkers, safety, development speed and the potential to generate several differentiated candidates.
A platform with one promising molecule and no evidence of repeatability will likely be treated as an asset opportunity rather than a strategic technology. Just saying you have a platform technology doesn’t mean that you have it… A platform with several weak candidates will probably not be considered useful. A strong proposition needs a validated mechanism, a coherent pipeline and a development route that Daiichi Sankyo can realistically scale.
Potentially relevant fields may include new ADC architectures, multispecific antibodies, radiopharmaceuticals, immune-cell engagement, targeted protein degradation, synthetic lethality, precision delivery and RNA therapeutics. These categories should not be mistaken for a published Daiichi Sankyo shopping list. They represent areas that may fit a search for repeatable post-DXd innovation. Your company still needs evidence of a direct strategic connection.
What Daiichi Sankyo Needs From External Companies
Daiichi Sankyo’s strategy creates four principal routes for external partners.
The first is expanding the reach of the current ADCs. This includes biomarkers, diagnostics, clinical recruitment, medical evidence, patient identification and market access.
The second is removing operational constraints. This includes manufacturing capacity, analytics, quality systems, clinical execution, laboratory networks and supply resilience.
The third is improving future ADC generations. This includes new targets, payloads, linkers, conjugation methods, translational models, resistance biology and safety prediction.
The fourth is providing a technology platform capable of generating growth after the current DXd franchise.
You and your team should decide which route it belongs to before approaching Daiichi Sankyo. A service provider should not disguise itself as a strategic platform company. A platform biotech should not reduce its proposition to a list of research services. A diagnostic company should not describe itself as a general oncology partner. The clearer your role, the easier it becomes for Daiichi Sankyo to identify an internal contact person.
How Your Company Should Position Its Capability
Your opening proposition should identify at least one Daiichi Sankyo-specific challenge. It might state that your company can reduce biomarker turnaround time across Asian clinical sites. It might explain that your technology identifies target heterogeneity more accurately in limited tumour samples. It might provide qualified secondary ADC conjugation capacity. It might show that your model distinguishes target loss from payload resistance. It might present a payload with activity in models resistant to topoisomerase I inhibition.
Those are propositions that Daiichi Sankyo can assess.
- “We are a leading oncology CRO” is not.
- “We provide an innovative AI platform” is not.
- “We offer end-to-end ADC solutions” is not.
Your general claims place the burden of finding relevance on Daiichi Sankyo. A strong proposition performs that work before contact.
Your proposal should answer five questions:
- Which Daiichi Sankyo product, target, programme or strategic objective does your capability support?
- Which scientific, clinical, manufacturing or commercial problem does it solve?
- What evidence demonstrates performance in a comparable setting?
- How will the capability integrate with Daiichi Sankyo’s systems and alliance responsibilities?
- Can your company scale when the programme succeeds?
These questions force your team to connect technical merit with strategic value.
You Need the Correct Internal Route
Daiichi Sankyo is a large global organisation with specialised functions and alliance structures.
Research teams assess target biology, platform technologies and early candidates. Development teams focus on clinical strategy and regulatory evidence. Manufacturing teams control process, quality, capacity and supply. Commercial and medical organisations address diagnosis, adoption, outcomes and patient access.
Your technology can be highly relevant and still fail to progress if you reach the wrong function.
A senior executive may appreciate your presentation without owning the problem. A specialist closer to the programme may become a stronger internal sponsor.
Your company needs an account map showing the relevant business unit, therapeutic programme, development stage, geography and alliance relationship. You should know which decisions can be made in Japan and which require global agreement.
Japanese pharmaceutical business also requires sustained trust. A strong scientific presentation may open the discussion. Continued progress depends on internal consensus, credible follow-up and confidence that your company will remain reliable when problems arise. You need to establish strong personal relationships and build trust before business happens.
Your Japan strategy must address the relationship AND the technical case. Business will not happen without both components.
The Opportunity Is in Daiichi Sankyo’s Next Phase
Daiichi Sankyo has already proved that its ADC science can produce globally important medicines. The next step is even more ambitious. They will extend those medicines into new populations, understand resistance, develop new payload concepts, increase production, secure global supply and turn a group of ADCs into a durable oncology business. They must also identify the platform that will sustain innovation after the current DXd portfolio reaches maturity.
All of these priorities create demand for external expertise.
The strongest opportunities will go to companies that solve a defined problem inside this strategy. They will not go to suppliers that attach the word “ADC” to a broad catalogue and expect Daiichi Sankyo to identify the value. Your company may possess a highly relevant technology. You still need to connect it to the correct programme, present strong evidence and reach the people responsible for the decision.
For supply partners, the task is to translate technical merit into Daiichi Sankyo-specific strategic relevance. Biosector helps life-science companies assess that fit, identify the correct route into Japanese pharma and prepare a credible first approach. As Japanese companies also require strong relationships, if you do not have a strong strategy for Japan, you need to build one.
We are happy to share our deep knowledge of Japan and help you analyse your strategies and setup for Japan. You are warmly welcome to contact us for an exploratory call.
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