The 2025 National Science and Technology Awards have accelerated the market's reassessment of value within the hog industry. The project "Breeding Technology and Core Germplasm Creation and Application of Huaxi Breeding Pigs," led by a team headed by Academician Huang Lusheng, Secretary of the Party Committee of Jiangxi Agricultural University, and involving 28 research institutions and leading enterprises, including Professor Zhu Li's team from Sichuan Agricultural University and DEKON AGR (02419), has been honored with the first prize of the National Science and Technology Progress Award. This marks the first time this top award has been won in China's swine breeding sector and stands as the sole first prize in the agricultural field this year, signaling the industry's formal shift from "scale expansion" to "core technology-driven" development. With its profound technological foundation, DEKON AGR has already built a solid, cycle-resistant moat.
In 2017, the "Zhongxin No.1" breeding gene chip, developed by Academician Huang Lusheng's team in collaboration with six research units including Sichuan Agricultural University, was officially launched. Subsequently, DEKON AGR, in partnership with the research team from Sichuan Agricultural University, developed a customized version based on "Zhongxin No.1" tailored to its own breeding requirements. This collaborative technological breakthrough not only ended the long-standing monopoly of Europe and America in the breeding chip field but also increased breeding efficiency by 22%, significantly reducing the cost of genomic breeding work. By integrating standardized breeding mechanisms with new technologies like genomic selection, DEKON AGR has established its own, iteratively improvable breeding system. This system supports the continuous improvement and widespread utilization of the company's core breeding population. To date, the company has achieved full genome testing coverage for all breeds within its core breeding herd. Through sustained, precise selection and matching, DEKON AGR has increased the average number of piglets per litter by approximately 0.2 and reduced the market-ready age of hogs by one day annually. More importantly, through its "company + family farm" model, the company has promoted Huaxi breeding pigs to over 20 provinces across the country, allowing farmers to truly benefit from the commercialization of scientific achievements and achieving large-scale improvement in breeding stock quality. DEKON AGR provides the industry with a complete closed loop from technological self-sufficiency to industrial application.
The Foundation of Competitive Advantage
Technological leadership is the starting point for building a deep competitive moat. Following the achievement of self-sufficient, controllable breeding sources, in December 2025, DEKON AGR, in collaboration with Sichuan Agricultural University, launched its own independently controlled breeding "super brain"—the "DEYU Cloud" platform. This marks the company's leap from "measurement and evaluation breeding" to "full-link digital and intelligent breeding." The platform, equipped with advanced genetic evaluation models, integrates over 400,000 growth performance data points, more than 5 million reproduction records, and tens of millions of production and slaughter data points, breaking down data silos across the entire chain. This dual barrier of "hardware plus software" not only continuously enhances breeding efficiency but also constructs a moat for digitalization in the seed industry.
Cost Leadership in a Competitive Market
Currently, the focus of competition in the hog market has fully shifted to cost control and supply chain synergy efficiency. DEKON AGR, leveraging its combination of "breeding source advantage + precision farming," has established a rare cost moat. As of June this year, its complete hog farming cost remained at an industry-leading level of around 11.8 RMB/kg, granting it robust survival and development capabilities even during industry-wide loss cycles. As the core competitiveness of DEKON AGR's breeding sources continues to strengthen and its independent, continuously evolving breeding system is further refined, its supportive role for the farming sector will become increasingly significant. In this industry reshuffle, leading enterprises like DEKON AGR will further capture market share through technological dividends.
A Signal for Market Revaluation
Winning the first prize of the National Science and Technology Progress Award serves as a significant signal for value reassessment in the capital markets for DEKON AGR. It clearly communicates a new logic to the market: in the hog industry, the true ability to weather cycles does not stem from accurately forecasting pig prices, but from systematic efficiency advantages and technological barriers. Through collaboration with research institutions like Sichuan Agricultural University, DEKON AGR has constructed a model of "independent breeding chips + digital intelligent platform + farmer linkage model," successfully transforming technological breakthroughs into a cost moat and ecosystem synergy advantage that is difficult to replicate. With the "China Chip" for breeding pigs now firmly in its own hands, DEKON AGR represents the long-term investment theme of Chinese agricultural enterprises achieving high-quality growth through technological empowerment. In future industry competition, DEKON AGR, armed with core technology, will continue to unlock its long-term value, positioning itself as one of the most certain value propositions in the capital markets.
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