Novavax and Sanofi to commercialize Covid vaccine, develop combo pictures
A well being employee prepares a dose of the Novavax vaccine because the Dutch Well being Service Group begins with the Novavax vaccination program on March 21, 2022 in The Hague, Netherlands.
Patrick Van Katwijk | Getty Pictures
Novavax on Friday mentioned it has signed a multibillion-dollar deal with French drugmaker Sanofi to co-commercialize the corporate’s Covid vaccine beginning subsequent yr and develop mixture pictures concentrating on the coronavirus and the flu, amongst different efforts.
The licensing settlement will enable Novavax to carry its “going concern” warning, which it first issued in February 2023 resulting from having doubts about its means to proceed working, Novavax CEO John Jacobs advised CNBC in an interview.
It marks a turning level for the struggling vaccine maker and its protein-based Covid shot. Well being officers view the vaccine as a helpful different for individuals who do not need to take messenger RNA jabs from Pfizer and Moderna.
A part of the deal permits Sanofi to make use of Novavax’s Covid shot and flagship vaccine know-how, Matrix-M adjuvant, to develop new vaccine merchandise. Sanofi can pay Novavax an upfront cost of $500 million and as much as $700 million in funds for improvement, regulatory and launch milestones.
That whole is roughly double Novavax’s present market cap of $627 million.
Novavax can also be entitled to royalty funds on Sanofi’s gross sales of its Covid vaccine and mixture pictures concentrating on coronavirus and the flu. Novavax will even obtain further launch and gross sales milestone funds of as much as $200 million, together with royalties, for every product Sanofi develops with Matrix-M adjuvant.
Beneath the deal, Sanofi will even take a lower than 5% stake in Novavax.
“It actually does assist our enterprise. It retains us effectively capitalized, it takes the going concern off, it offers us the prospect to pivot our technique extra in direction of what we’re finest at — to convey further worth to all of our stakeholders, together with our shareholders,” Jacobs advised CNBC.
The deal additionally will assist the corporate fulfill its mission of enhancing international public well being with its vaccine know-how platform “at a tempo and a scale that we might have by no means carried out if we saved all of it to ourselves” resulting from a scarcity of assets, capital and scope, Jacobs mentioned.
Deal phrases
Novavax will lead the commercialization of its Covid shot for the remainder of this yr and can switch most of that duty to Sanofi in 2025. Sanofi will not oversee commercialization in nations that Novavax has present partnership agreements with, together with India, Japan and South Korea, together with nations with superior Covid vaccine buy agreements with the corporate.
Jacobs mentioned Sanofi, as a big pharmaceutical firm, might improve the market share and presence of Novavax’s Covid vaccine, which can broaden affected person entry to the shot.
The deal additionally permits Sanofi to develop merchandise that mix its flu shot or different in-house vaccines with Novavax’s Covid jab. Sanofi may use Novavax’s Matrix-M adjuvant to develop new vaccine merchandise.
Notably, Sanofi shall be solely liable for the event and commercialization of any mixture shot containing its flu vaccine and Novavax’s Covid shot.
“Via this settlement with a world chief like Sanofi, not solely in commercialization but in addition in improvement, we consider that this multiplies immensely the chance to convey forth a number of new vaccines far more shortly,” Jacobs mentioned.
Exterior of the deal, Novavax expects to begin a late-stage trial by itself mixture vaccine concentrating on Covid and the flu and its stand-alone flu shot later this yr. Beforehand, Novavax mentioned that trial would solely embody the mix vaccine.
“Now our section three trial, that we’re on observe to provoke within the second half of this yr, will not simply have one potential licensable vaccine ought to we succeed, however it is going to have two,” Jacob mentioned, noting the deal “frees up prices” and “opens up our personal natural pipeline.”
