Novartis Will Help Manufacture CureVac's Covid-19 Vaccine - Barron's

Novartis and other companies are assisting in the manufacturing of a number of Covid-19... — Novartis and other companies are assisting in the manufacturing of a number of Covid-19 vaccines.
Stefan Wermuth/Bloomberg

The European drug giant Novartis said Thursday that it would manufacture doses of CureVac’s experimental Covid-19 vaccine beginning this summer.

The partnership is the latest agreement between drug companies to assist in the manufacturing of various Covid-19 vaccines, coming days after the White House announced that Merck (ticker: MRK) will manufacture doses of Johnson & Johnson’s (JNJ) Covid-19 vaccine.

CureVac’s Covid-19 vaccine, known as CVnCoV, isn’t yet authorized anywhere in the world. The company, based in Germany, began a rolling submission of the vaccine with European drug regulators in mid-February. A Phase 2b/3 clinical trial of the vaccine is ongoing.

Under the terms of the newly announced agreement, Novartis (NVS) will manufacture 50 million doses of the vaccine by the end of this year, and up to 200 million more by the end of next year, with deliveries beginning this summer.

That’s on top of a previously-announced arrangement by which GlaxoSmithKline (GSK)—which is also collaborating with CureVac on another, second-generation Covid-19 vaccine—will manufacture 100 million doses of CVnCoV this year.

Shares of CureVac were up 4.1% in premarket trading Thursday, but slipped 1.3% recently in the regular session. The stock, which went public last summer, fell 10% on Wednesday. Of the five analysts who cover the stock tracked by FactSet, two rate it a Buy, two rate it a Hold, and one rates it a Sell.

“I am very pleased that with Novartis we have found another highly experienced partner to support the production of our vaccine candidate,” said CureVac’s chief production officer, Florian von der Mülbe. “Together with Novartis we expect to increase significantly our manufacturing capacity and place our production network on an even broader base.”

In addition to the deal with GlaxoSmithKline, Bayer is also collaborating with CureVac on development and supply of CVnCoV.

CureVac’s Covid-19 vaccine uses a messenger RNA approach, just like the vaccines developed by Moderna (MRNA) and Pfizer (PFE) in collaboration with its partner BioNTech (BNTX).

CureVac was one of the four leading messenger RNA-focused biotechs before the Covid-19 pandemic began. Two of the four, Moderna and BioNTech, now have Covid-19 vaccines with emergency use authorization from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The fourth, Translate Bio (TBIO), is collaborating with Sanofi (SNY) on a Covid-19 vaccine currently in development.

In a statement on Thursday, Novartis’s global head of technical operations, Steffen Lang, said that the company was expanding its manufacturing site in Kundl, Austria, to allow it to produce the CureVac vaccine.

Write to Josh Nathan-Kazis at josh.nathan-kazis@barrons.com

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