Amid Covid-19 hunt, Pfiz­er adds Ly­me dis­ease vac­cine in $308M deal with Val­ne­va

In the midst of their $500 mil­lion pro­gram to build a Covid-19 vac­cine with BioN­Tech, Pfiz­er has an­nounced a siz­able deal to com­mer­cial­ize a vac­cine for a far dif­fer­ent dis­ease.

Pfiz­er and Val­ne­va have agreed to an up-to $308 mil­lion deal on the French biotech’s Ly­me dis­ease vac­cine. The deal in­cludes a $130 mil­lion up­front pay­ment for Val­ne­va, whose can­di­date is now in Phase II. On top of that, there are mile­stones and ul­ti­mate­ly a 19% roy­al­ty on sales. Val­ne­va will still be in charge of 30% of the com­mer­cial­iza­tion costs.

Al­though the vac­cine mar­ket has been ail­ing for years, Pfiz­er has a block­buster in their pneu­mo­coc­cal vac­cine, Pre­vnar 13, and are in late stages on a suc­ces­sor vac­cine. The deal comes at a time of re­newed in­ter­est in the field, a phe­nom­e­non the Covid-19 pan­dem­ic and the drug hunt around it have on­ly ac­cel­er­at­ed. Ear­li­er this month, Affini­vax raised $120 mil­lion in a Se­ries C, and in March, SutroVax raised $110 mil­lion for their at­tempt to ri­val Pfiz­er’s Pre­vnar 13 — both stan­dard sums these days for on­col­o­gy but large in the con­text of in­fec­tious dis­ease re­search.

The hunt for a Ly­me dis­ease vac­cine is decades old, dat­ing to not long af­ter the dis­cov­ery of the tick-born ill­ness and the bac­te­ria that caused it in the 1970s and 80s. In 1998, SmithK­line Beecham beat out Pas­teur Mérieux Con­naught (the Sanofi Pas­teur pre­de­ces­sor) and got LY­MEr­ix, a re­com­bi­nant DNA vac­cine that re­quired 3 shots and was about 80% ef­fec­tive, ap­proved by the FDA.

The ap­proval, though, dove­tailed with the be­gin­nings of the mod­ern an­ti-vac­ci­na­tion move­ment in the Unit­ed States. Grow­ing re­ports of joint pain and oth­er safe­ty com­plaints with the vac­cine led to a class ac­tion law­suit against SmithK­line. Al­though the suit was set­tled with­out com­pen­sa­tion and an FDA re­view found no ev­i­dence for arthri­tis or oth­er un­ex­pect­ed ad­verse ef­fects, sales dropped pre­cip­i­tous­ly. SmithK­line pulled the drug off the mar­ket in 2002, cit­ing poor com­mer­cial per­for­mance.

The con­tro­ver­sy set back the field con­sid­er­ably. Pas­teur Mérieux Con­naught nev­er ap­plied for their vac­cine. To­day, al­though you can in­oc­u­late your dog against Ly­me dis­ease, you can­not in­oc­u­late your­self or your kid.

Thomas Lin­gel­bach

Val­ne­va, cre­at­ed af­ter the failed Aus­tri­an vac­cine com­pa­ny In­ter­cell merged with the French biotech Vi­valis in 2012, be­gan work­ing on a Ly­me dis­ease vac­cine short­ly af­ter its birth. They claim to have the on­ly Ly­me dis­ease vac­cine in de­vel­op­ment.

The vac­cine, VLA15, tar­gets the six most com­mon types of Bor­re­lia bac­te­ria that cause Ly­me dis­ease, mak­ing it a po­ten­tial can­di­date for use across Eu­rope and North Amer­i­ca. It is a pro­tein sub­unit vac­cine, mean­ing it con­tains on­ly the anti­gens from the bac­te­ria that the body will make an­ti­bod­ies against. They have fast-track des­ig­na­tion and are ex­pect­ing re­sults from their Phase II by mid-2020. CEO Thomas Lin­gel­bach has said he ex­pects to bring the prod­uct to mar­ket in 4-5 years.

The num­ber of peo­ple di­ag­nosed with Ly­me dis­ease has ex­pand­ed con­sid­er­ably in Amer­i­ca and Eu­rope in the two decades since LY­MEx­is’s ap­proval, po­ten­tial­ly set­ting up a large mar­ket if the vac­cine is ap­proved.

So­cial: Thomas Lin­gel­bach, Val­ne­va CEO via YouTube

Forge Bi­o­log­ics’ cGMP Com­pli­ant and Com­mer­cial­ly Vi­able Be­spoke Affin­i­ty Chro­matog­ra­phy Plat­form

Forge Biologics has developed a bespoke affinity chromatography platform approach that factors in unique vector combinations to streamline development timelines and assist our clients in efficiently entering the clinic. By leveraging our experience with natural and novel serotypes and transgene conformations, we are able to accelerate affinity chromatography development by nearly 3-fold. Many downstream purification models are serotype-dependent, demanding unique and time-consuming development strategies for each AAV gene therapy product1. With the increasing demand to propel AAV gene therapies to market, platform purification methods that support commercial-scale manufacturing of high-quality vectors with excellent safety and efficacy profiles are essential.

Mathai Mammen, FogPharma's next CEO

Math­ai Mam­men hands in J&J's R&D keys to lead Greg Ver­dine’s Fog­Phar­ma 

In the early 1990s, Mathai Mammen was a teaching assistant in Greg Verdine’s Science B46 course at Harvard. In June, the former R&D head at Johnson & Johnson will succeed Verdine as CEO, president and chair of FogPharma, the same month the seven-year-old biotech kickstarts its first clinical trial.

After leading R&D at one of the largest drugmakers in the world, taking the company through more than half a dozen drug approvals in the past few years, not to mention a Covid-19 vaccine race, Mammen departed J&J last month and will take the helm of a Cambridge, MA biotech attempting to go after what Verdine calls the “true emperor of all oncogenes” — beta-catenin.

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Nicklas Westerholm, Egetis Therapeutics CEO

Ac­qui­si­tion talks on­go­ing for Swedish rare dis­ease biotech Egetis, shares up al­most 40%

Shares of the Sweden-based rare disease biotech Egetis Therapeutics skyrocketed on Thursday afternoon as the company said it’s engaged in “ongoing discussion” with external parties regarding a “potential acquisition.”

Egetis confirmed rumors with a statement on Thursday while noting that there is no certainty that a takeover offer will be made.

Nonetheless, the possibility of an acquisition has shot up Egetis’ share price. By the afternoon on Thursday, its stock price was {$EGTX.ST} up over 38%. An Egetis spokesperson told Endpoints News in an email that it has no further comments.

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Stéphane Bancel, Moderna CEO (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)

Mod­er­na so­lid­i­fies deal with Kenya to build mR­NA man­u­fac­tur­ing fa­cil­i­ty

The mRNA player Moderna is further cementing its presence on the African continent.

Moderna announced on Thursday that it has finalized an agreement with Kenya’s government to partner up and bring an mRNA manufacturing facility to the east African nation. The new facility aims to manufacture up to 500 million doses of vaccines annually. Moderna also said the new facility will have the ability to spike its production capabilities to respond to public health emergencies on the continent or globally.

Luke Miels, GSK chief commercial officer

GSK picks up Scynex­is' FDA-ap­proved an­ti­fun­gal drug for $90M up­front

GSK is dishing out $90 million cash to add an antifungal drug to its commercial portfolio, in a deal spotlighting the pharma giant’s growing focus on infectious diseases.

The upfront will lock in an exclusive license to Scynexis’ Brexafemme, which was approved in 2021 to treat a yeast infection known as vulvovaginal candidiasis, except in China and certain other countries where Scynexis already out-licensed the drug.

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Sen­ate Fi­nance Com­mit­tee lobs more bi­par­ti­san pres­sure on­to PBMs

Congress is honing in on how it wants to overhaul the rules of the road for pharmacy benefit managers, with a Senate Finance Committee hearing Thursday serving as the latest example of the Hill’s readiness to make changes to how pharma middlemen operate.

While pledging to ensure patients and pharmacies “don’t get a raw deal,” Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden (D-OR) laid out the beginning of what looks like a major bipartisan effort — moves the PBM industry is likely to challenge vigorously.

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Deborah Waterhouse, ViiV Healthcare CEO

MPP re­cruits three gener­ic man­u­fac­tur­ers to ex­pand use of Vi­iV's in­jectable PrEP drug

ViiV Healthcare has teamed up with the UN-backed Medicines Patent Pool and three generic manufacturers to expand access to medicine that can prevent HIV.

ViiV and the Medicines Patent Pool jointly announced Thursday that the MPP signed sub-licensing agreements with Aurobindo, Cipla and Viatris to manufacture generics of a long-acting form of cabotegravir for HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP). As a result of the agreement, the manufacturers will be able to develop, manufacture and supply generic versions of cabotegravir LA in 90 countries — subject to regulatory approvals.

Lu­pus drug de­vel­op­ment mar­ket heat­ing up, while FDA links with ad­vo­ca­cy group to fur­ther ac­cel­er­ate re­search

The long-underserved systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) market is suddenly buzzing with treatment possibilities. Less than two years after AstraZeneca’s approval for Saphnelo — the first new SLE drug in a decade and joining just one other approved in GSK’s Benlysta – the pipeline of potential drugs numbers in the dozens.

Although most are very early stage — Spherix Global Insights estimates five in Phase II/III — the pharma R&D enthusiasm is catching on among doctors, patients and advocacy groups. On Wednesday, the Lupus Research Alliance and the FDA formed a novel private-public partnership called Lupus Accelerating Breakthroughs Consortium (Lupus ABC) to help advance lupus clinical trial success.

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Cedric Ververken, Confo Therapeutics CEO

Dai­ichi Sankyo inks $183M dis­cov­ery deal with GPCR biotech for CNS tar­get

Belgian biotech Confo Therapeutics has landed $183 million, plus potential royalties, in a drug-discovery deal with Daiichi Sankyo.

Early Thursday, Confo Therapeutics put out word of the deal that will be focused on small molecule antagonists to go after an undisclosed target that the company says is associated with CNS diseases.

Confo CEO Cedric Ververken told Endpoints News that Daiichi originally reached out to learn about the biotech’s technology. He added that Confo, founded in 2015, will use its platform to drug a GPCR target that Daiichi has struggled with internally.