The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) and Pune-based Gennova Biopharmaceuticals Ltd, on Tuesday announced a new funding agreement to advance the development of their self-amplifying mRNA (saRNA) platform to develop vaccine candidates against unknown pathogenic threats, also referred to as Disease X.
According to a press statement, CEPI will provide up to $3.6 million to support the optimisation of the saRNA-platform technology, the production process, and yield. A vaccine candidate will then be produced against rabies virus, part of the Rhabdoviridae family of viruses, for preclinical studies. Testing the vaccine candidate against this known virus, with accepted correlates of protection, will help to assess the concepts behind this new technology.
This funding forms part of CEPI’s programme to support novel RNA vaccine platform technologies for emerging and select endemic infectious diseases, which could offer substantial advantages over existing mRNA technologies, such as multivalency, improved immunogenicity, storage and stability, productivity, response time, and cost-of-goods.
“Gennova’s saRNA vaccine platform could form part of a group of RNA technologies that CEPI is supporting that could enable rapid responses to future epidemics and pandemic threats, potentially within 100 days of identification,” it stated.
Through its agreement to enter into partnership with CEPI, Gennova has demonstrated its shared commitment to ensuring equitable access to its technology in line with CEPI’s Equitable Access Policy, notably committing to vaccines being available first to populations at risk when and where they are needed at an affordable price, the company said in a statement.
“Advances in RNA-vaccine technology were critical to the global response to COVID-19 and will be crucial for future epidemic and pandemic responses. To make sure the world has access to such technology quickly and equitably the next time Disease X strikes, CEPI is supporting novel RNA vaccine technologies with significantly improved attributes—in terms of scalability, thermostability, immunogenicity, and affordability—that could provide versatile platforms for rapid response against emerging infectious threats,” Dr Melanie Saville, Executive Director of Vaccine R&D said in a statement.
This also includes the potential application of its technology to future vaccine development of interest to CEPI, including a commitment to technology transfer, it stated.
“We are very pleased to be entering into a funding agreement with CEPI. Gennova’s decade-long collaborations with eminent research institutes across the world like the USFDA, NIH, JHU, OSU, WEHI, LSHTM, SSI etc. in the field of infectious diseases and vaccinology, prepared Gennova to rise to the challenge of making an mRNA-based pandemic-ready manufacturing platform. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit and paralyzed the world, Gennova developed two of its mRNA-based vaccines for COVID-19, which got EUA in India, validating the platform technology. The effort was supported by the Department of Biotechnology (DBT) through partial strategic seed funding from the COVID-19 Consortium under the Ind-CEPI Mission, ‘Epidemic preparedness through rapid vaccine development: Support of Indian vaccine development aligned with the global initiative of the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI)’. On a bigger canvas, we look forward to working together with CEPI to further improve the saRNA-technology platform aiding in vaccine democratization and equitable access,” Dr Sanjay Singh, Chief Executive Officer, said in a statement.
