Novavax On Friday it said it had signed one billion dollar deal with the French drug manufacturer Sanofi Among other things, to jointly market the corporate's Covid vaccine from next yr and to develop combination vaccines against the coronavirus and the flu.
The license agreement will allow Novavax to lift its initial going concern warning issued in February 2023 resulting from doubts about its ability to proceed operations, Novavax CEO John Jacobs said in an interview with CNBC.
It marks a turning point for the struggling vaccine maker and its protein-based Covid shot. Health officials view the vaccine as a beneficial alternative for individuals who don't wish to receive messenger RNA shots Pfizer And Modern.
Part of the deal allows Sanofi to make use of Novavax's Covid vaccination and flagship vaccine technology. Matrix-M adjuvantto develop recent vaccine products. Sanofi pays Novavax an upfront payment of $500 million and as much as $700 million in development, regulatory and business launch milestone payments.
That sum is roughly double Novavax's current market cap of $627 million.
Novavax can also be entitled to royalties on Sanofi's sales of its Covid vaccine and combination coronavirus and flu vaccines. Novavax may even receive additional launch and sales milestone payments of as much as $200 million and royalties for every product Sanofi develops using the adjuvant Matrix-M.
As a part of the deal, Sanofi may even take a lower than 5% stake in Novavax.
“It really helps our business. It ensures that we are well capitalized, it relieves us of the going concern burden and gives us the opportunity to focus our strategy more closely on what we do best – creating value for all our stakeholders and our shareholders,” Jacobs told our shareholders CNBC.
The deal may even help the corporate fulfill its mission to enhance global public health with its vaccine technology platform, “at a pace and scale that we could never have achieved if we had kept it all to ourselves,” since it lacks scope in resources, capital, etc., Jacobs said.
Terms of contract
Novavax will lead the commercialization of its Covid shot for the remaining of this yr, handing most of that responsibility to Sanofi in 2025. Sanofi won’t oversee commercialization in countries with which Novavax has existing partnership agreements, including India, Japan and South Korea, together with countries with advanced Covid vaccine purchasing agreements with the corporate.
Jacobs said Sanofi, as a big pharmaceutical company, could increase the market share and presence of Novavax's Covid vaccine, which might expand patient access to vaccination.
The deal also allows Sanofi to develop products that mix its flu shot or other proprietary vaccines with Novavax's Covid shot. Sanofi may use Novavax's Matrix-M adjuvant to develop recent vaccine products.
Specifically, Sanofi will probably be solely liable for the event and commercialization of all combination vaccines containing its flu vaccine and Novavax's Covid vaccine.
“Through this agreement with a global leader like Sanofi, not only in commercialization but also in development, we believe this greatly multiplies the opportunities to bring multiple new vaccines to market much more quickly,” Jacobs said.
Aside from the agreement, Novavax expects to start late-stage testing of its own Covid-flu combination vaccine and its standalone flu shot later this yr. Previously, Novavax said the study would only include the mixture vaccine.
“Now our Phase 3 trial, which we expect to start in the second half of this year, will have not just one potentially registrable vaccine should we be successful, but two,” Jacob said, noting the deal. “relieves costs” and “opens up our own organic pipeline.”
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