Nanjing, China-based pharma NJCTTQ will pay up to $4 billion as part of a deal to boost its R&D in antibody therapies for oncology. Abpro, located in Woburn, Massachusetts, will receive $60 million up front and up to $4 billion in milestones and royalties to generate dual-targeting T-cell engager antibodies using its antibody engineering platform. NJCTTQ (Nanjing Chiatai Tianqing) is an R&D center for parent company Chiatai Tianqing. The deal is one of the largest US–China immuno-oncology tie-ups to date. NJCTTQ will take advantage Abpro’s DiversImmune platform, which uses novel immunization methods (using purified proteins, engineered cells, virus-like particles and DNA) and co-stimulation strategies to generate antibodies with custom-targeted antigens. These antibodies can then be engineered into bivalent, trivalent or tetravalent bispecific formats using Abpro’s MultiMab platform. Bispecific antibodies promote T-cell engagement by binding simultaneously to tumor-specific antigen on a cancer cell and to an antigen (usually CD3) on a cytotoxic T cell. This engagement causes the T cell to kill the tumor cell. Tumor cell targets in the deal were not disclosed. A small number of bispecific antibodies are already in clinical trials in China, including Blincyto (blinatumomab, Amgen), which received US FDA accelerated approval in 2018. Chinese companies are investing heavily in US biotech (Nat. Biotechnol. 36, 8–9, 2018) to gain access to cutting-edge science. This is fueled by China’s changing drug landscape, including major regulatory reforms and government-led initiatives to increase the number of home-grown biopharma products. Oncology is a particular focus of China’s biotech buzz, as the country needs new treatments for its many patients with advanced or metastatic tumors.