The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, along with Gavi-The Vaccine Alliance, will provide at-risk funding of $150 million to Serum Institute of India to support the production of two promising vaccines by University of Oxford and Novavax on the condition that the Pune-based firm prices the two vaccines at a maximum of $3 per dose.
Under the pact, Serum Institute will receive funding from the Gates Foundation through Gavi-The Vaccine Alliance, and also become part of the Gavi Covax Advance Market Commitment mechanism for equitable access to vaccines for India and other low and middle-income nations.
With a vaccine needed urgently, vaccine makers globally are taking a risk by investing in capacity for candidates despite them still being in clinical trial stage. To aid this effort, governments and Gavi—a global organization founded by the Gates Foundation to improve access to new vaccines in poor countries—are providing funding to reduce the risk for manufacturers while, in return, securing supplies if approval is granted.
The collaboration using the foundation’s Strategic Investment Fund will provide upfront capital to Serum Institute, the world’s largest vaccine manufacturer by volume, to help it boost capacity so that once a vaccine gets regulatory nod and EHO’s prequalification, up to 100 million doses can be produced at scale for distribution in India and other countries as early as the first half of 2021.
“…to ensure maximum immunization coverage and contain the pandemic, it is important to make sure that the most remote and poorest countries have access to affordable cure and preventive measures. Through this association, we seek to ramp up our constant efforts to save the lives of millions from this dreadful disease,” Serum Institute CEO Adar Poonawalla said in a note.
Serum Institute will start clinical trials for the Oxford vaccine in the coming week after having received approval from the Drug Controller General of India, V.G. Somani, earlier this week. The second and third phase trials of about 1,600 patients will be conducted across 17 sites in India.
Serum Institute had in June signed a pact to provide a billion doses of the vaccine, and on Thursday signed a pact with Novovax to produce a minimum of 1 billion doses of its candidate NVX‑CoV2373 for India and other low-income countries.
