Oxford Biomedica joins a team working on COVID-19 vaccine candidate

Oxford Biomedica said Wednesday it has joined a Consortium lead by the Jenner Institute, Oxford University, to work on a potential vaccine candidate for COVID-19, called ChAdOx1 nCov-19.

In a press release, Oxfor Biomedica said that this vaccine candidate is one of the leading vaccine candidates currently in development globally, and is expected to be the UK’s first COVID-19 vaccine in clinical trials later this month.

The Consortium is led by the Jenner Institute, University of Oxford and also includes the Vaccines Manufacturing and Innovation Centre (VMIC), Pall Life Sciences, Cobra Biologics and Halix BV.

The Jenner Institute and the Oxford Vaccine Group have recruited individuals aged 18-55 from the Thames Valley area in the UK to study the vaccine’s safety and efficacy. Oxford Biomedica will provide access to its large scale GMP manufacturing facilities for viral vectors, including its new Oxbox facility, to the Consortium as required, which, along with other Consortium manufacturing partners in the UK and internationally, would allow for scaled manufacturing capacity should the safety and efficacy of the vaccine candidate be confirmed in clinical trials.

The Oxford vaccine candidate relies on adenoviral vector technology, ChAdOx1, developed at the Jenner Institute, in Oxford. It is seen as one of the most promising vaccine technologies for COVID-19 as ChAdOx1 has been shown to generate a strong immune response from one dose and it has demonstrated a good safety profile in pre-clinical and clinical trials conducted to date. No financial terms were disclosed.

John Dawson, Chief Executive Officer of Oxford Biomedica, noted that this is a promising vaccine candidate for COVID-19 and that the company will support the efforts of the Consortium to develop and scale up manufacturing of it.

“While our current activities on this vaccine candidate are just initiating, should the Consortium confirm there is promise for this candidate in the clinical trial initiating this month, we will play our role within the Consortium to scale up manufacturing as fast as possible. This will help to provide significant access to the vaccine candidate for further clinical trials and potentially, if approved for use, for many people in the UK and beyond.”