The project of Economic empirical study on the R&D costs of innovative drugs in China was jointly funded by the Industrial Development and Promotion Center of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the Project Management Office of "Major Innovative Drug Development" under National Science and Technology Major Project. The research was carried out in November 2019.This study conducted a systematic economic study on the R&D costs and influencing factors associated with innovative drugs in China. To be more specific, the project first established a database of the costs of innovative drugs in China. Furthermore, this study utilized two-stage statistical estimation, survival analysis and capital asset pricing models to analyze and measure the overall average R&D cost of drugs, including actual out-of-pocket cost, time cost and opportunity cost. Secondly, the project compared the innovative drugs which were supported by "Major Innovative Drug Development" with the whole industry innovative drugs in terms of R&D capital cost rate, research cycle, R&D success rates, etc. The project will provide empirical evidence for optimizing the investment mode of public funds to promote the R&D of innovative drugs and support for optimizing the R&D environment of innovative drugs in China.