Intravacc and EpiVax announce that they have entered into a collaboration agreement to further progress an novel vaccine against COVID-19, based on Intravacc’s proprietary Outer Membrane Vesicles (OMV) technology platform.
For this joint research project, Intravacc will combine its safe and immunogenic OMV delivery platform with synthetically produced COVID-19 epitopes (protein allergens), designed and optimized by EpiVax using advanced immunoinformatics tools, in order to generate a safe and highly effective T-cell response against SARS-CoV-2 and related coronaviruses. Pre-clinical studies will start immediately so as to select the best candidate peptides for the vaccine. Intravacc will utilize its in-house pilot-scale facility for the GMP production of the OMV-peptide vaccine, for clinical (phase I) studies expecting to start in Q4 2020.
Annie De Groot, MD, CEO and CSO of EpiVax, said:
“We are thrilled to enter into a partnership with Intravacc using their very novel ‘click-on’ OMV technology and the highly immunogenic and safe SARS-CoV-2 multi-epitope-bearing peptides designed using the iVAX toolkit at EpiVax. We believe that the combination of technologies and the strength of our longstanding collaboration with Intravacc will lead to the development of an effective and safe vaccine that could rapidly benefit hundreds of millions of people around the globe.”
Dr. Jan Groen, CEO of Intravacc, stated:
“A COVID-19 vaccine based on this approach is expected to be very safe and to reduce the morbidity and mortality rates associated with COVID-19. The vaccine is expected to lower the risk that individuals infected with SARS-CoV-2 will require hospitalization and/or intensive care. It also expected to induce long-term memory responses to prevent COVID-19 disease and infection from other beta-corona viruses. We expect that leveraging Intravacc’s unique vaccine development expertise, broad-based network and successful track record in global technology transfer to vaccine manufacturers will bring success”.