SK Bioscience Expanding Covid Vaccine Output
South Korea-based CDMO SK Bioscience, with cash in hand from an initial public offering, has announced plans to pour 150 billion won ($132 million) into vaccine production up to 2024, which will mean to adding some 99,130 m2 of production space and equipping its plant at Andong to make newer mRNA- and viral vector-based Covid-19 vaccines.
The company has permission from the government of Korea’s North Gyeongsang Province and the city of Andong to expand its plant and buy new land. The facility, which produces both the AstraZeneca and Novavax vaccines, recently got the EU’s green light to market Covid vaccines in the single market, the Reuters news agency reported. No details have been revealed as to the number of doses it will supply. Under the Novavax deal, it will market the vaccine in Korea, when the shot is approved.
SK’s Andong site is also home to its L House vaccine plant, which it operates alongside an R&D center and its headquarters building. When announcing the ipo in February this year, the biotech said it had nine vaccine production lines. According to reports, the company aimed to take in $900 million from the offering, with about half going toward funding the vaccine expansion.
The Korean CDMO is also working toward the launch of its own recombinant protein vaccine GBP510, which uses GlaxoSmithKline's AS03 adjuvant. According to US trade journal Fierce Pharma, this candidate entered a phase 1/2 study in February, and the company hopes to bring the shot to market in the first half of 2022. SK is also said to be testing the vaccine without the GSK adjuvant. SK's other candidate, dubbed NBP200, has now entered Phase 1 trials.
Author: Dede Williams, Freelance Journalist
