In Iron Man (2008), an American industrialist says to an Asian warlord, “Technology. It’s always been your Achilles’ heel in this part of the world.”
While that may not always have been true, it certainly has been for the last 600 years or so. The Chinese had ships much larger than Columbus ever did, but culture got in the way. Because aristocrats feared international trade would enrich merchants, the Ming Dynasty banned oceangoing voyages in 1430. By 1500, the emperor made it a capital offense to build private ships with more than two masts!
Technology wasn’t the Achilles heel — culture was.
As we contemplate the future, it’s important to remember this history. As President Donald Trump hosted his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping in Washington, artificial intelligence sat near the top of the agenda. Because of AI’s potential to affect everything, the AI race symbolizes the larger contest for technological supremacy. But while the AI discussion is so high-profile, a quieter and arguably more consequential race is unfolding in biotech.
The biotech race is just as important as the AI race. The United States has significant advantages. America’s research universities remain unparalleled, and our biotech ecosystem continues to attract global investment. These strengths are the result of decades of investment and a rule of law that spurs innovation because it protects investors and inventors.
In China, bribery is simply the cost of doing business, whereas America remains the land of the free.
Recently reinvigorated commitment — including over $370 billion in investments over the next five years — to onshoring pharmaceutical manufacturing underscores that these efforts remain in America. But China’s government can move unencumbered. Through state-backed financing and coordinated policy, China is rapidly building capacity in genomics, biomanufacturing, and drug discovery. Since 2022, the number of first-in-class drug candidates from Chinese companies has increased by 360%, compared with 100%-150% for companies in the U.S., Japan, and the European Union.
Chinese firms are taking advantage of lower costs and fewer regulatory constraints to compete at the forefront. China’s time from molecule discovery to human clinical trials is 50%-70% faster than any other country, and patient enrollment in clinical trials is two to five times faster.
But Washington’s newest idea for countering China’s rise threatens to make matters worse. The Comprehensive Outbound Investment National Security Act would grant the Treasury Department the power to restrict or even block American investment in China and other countries of concern in sectors deemed a security risk. The legislation was intended to target AI, but U.S. officials are now considering adding biotech as well.
This would backfire the same way the Ming Dynasty’s ludicrous policy on ships backfired.
If the COINS Act were broadened to cover the biopharmaceutical industry, American firms would lose access to licensing arrangements, collaborative research, and supplier relationships that currently let U.S. companies advance therapies rooted in early compounds discovered in China. Far from putting China at a disadvantage, this would leave Beijing as the sole gatekeeper for those emerging treatments — putting the medicines American patients rely on at risk of delay or denial altogether.
This would be throwing out the biopharmaceutical baby with the AI bathwater.
For years, U.S. policymakers have relied on the idea that our market-driven system will naturally allow us to outpace competitors. That may be true in many sectors, but biotechnology is not a typical market. It is capital-intensive, high-risk, and dependent on much longer-term planning than, say, app development.
At the same time, this reassessment must not compromise the Food and Drug Administration’s decadeslong reputation grounded in rigorous science that has made us the gold standard for biomedical innovation. The recent launch of Operation TrialBlazer by the Department of Health and Human Services is a step in the right direction. It’s a coordinated effort to address the unnecessary delays without sacrificing the standards that have long set the U.S. apart.
As lawmakers consider policies that serve to address biotech’s future, the goal should be to strengthen the innovation ecosystem, not erode its foundations — and that includes making sure tools, including the COINS Act, stay aimed at the technologies they were built for.
Last week’s summit is itself a reminder that leadership in emerging technology doesn’t happen by default, any more than sailing the ocean did 500 years ago.
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The next era-defining breakthrough did not dominate the summit agenda the way AI or chip export controls do, but its impact on American lives will be just as immediate and far more lasting. Whether the U.S. leads or loses ground will depend on the choices it makes today, starting with keeping the COINS Act focused on the race it was designed to win.
Weaknesses in this sector carry global, strategic consequences. We can’t let technology become our Achilles’ heel in this part of the world.
Jared Whitley is a longtime D.C. politico, having worked in the U.S. Senate, White House, and defense industry. He has a Master of Business Administration from Hult International Business School in Dubai. This year, the Society of Professional Journalists awarded him in its best columnist competition.