Valneva starts manufacturing Covid-19 vaccine

VALNEVA has announced that it has started manufacturing its Covid-19 vaccine as clinical trials are ongoing.

Specialist vaccine company Valneva has now started production of its Covid-19 vaccine candidate at its manufacturing site in Livingstone, Scotland. Valneva is using the manufacturing technology used for its licensed Japanese encephalitis vaccine, IXIARO. The technology has already been scaled up to industrial scale for IXIARO.

The UK Government invested in Valneva in September as it aimed to expand vaccine manufacturing capacity. Valneva's initial agreement with the UK Government is to provide 60m doses in the second half of 2021, if the vaccine is shown to be safe and effective. A further agreement was made with the Government for an additional 40m doses into 2022. Valneva is also in advanced discussions with the EU to provide 60m doses.

Thomas Lingelbach, Chief Executive Officer of Valneva, said: “We are extremely pleased to have achieved these two important milestones in such a short period of time. Our team in Scotland have done an amazing job to get manufacturing started so quickly. I would like to thank the UK Vaccines Taskforce and National Institute for Health Research who have played vital roles in the rapid recruitment and enrolment of the volunteers for the clinical study. We believe that our vaccine, assuming successful development, can make a major contribution in the UK and beyond.”

The vaccine candidate, VLA2001, is the only inactivated adjuvanted Covid-19 vaccine in clinical trials in Europe. It uses an inactive part of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, along with adjuvants which boost immune response. VLA2001 is currently undergoing phase 1 and 2 clinical trials and initial results are expected in April.