GSK Does Not Plan to Profit from Its COVID-19 Vaccine Response Booster Technology

Last Thursday, pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline announced that it will manufacture one billion doses of vaccine response boosters to support immunization for the COVID-19 pandemic.

In an attempt to develop an outstanding solution against coronavirus, one of the world's biggest vaccine companies will lead the development of vaccine boosters or adjuvants to scale up enough doses of future vaccines.

Despite the reduction of doses, GSK's adjuvant technology will create a stronger and lasting immunity when partnered with the vaccine to better fight off infections. Thus, paving the way for immunization in a higher-volume setting.

The company is targeting sites in Europe, Canada, and the U.S. to team up with companies--while now working with Sanofi--in the development of an experimental vaccine. In a surprising turn, the company also revealed that they have no plans of making profit from their technology and will instead put any financial gain into future research to improve preparedness in case of a pandemic.

In line with this, the pharmaceutical giant also said that it will be sharing its technological knowledge with other vaccine developers, starting with the University of Queensland in Australia.

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"We believe that more than one vaccine will be needed to address this global pandemic and we are working with partners around the world to do so," GSK Global Vaccines President Roger Connor said. "We believe that our innovative pandemic adjuvant technology has the potential to help improve the efficacy and scale up of multiple COVID-19 vaccines." 

Connor added that this opening out to other countries will further help deliver their goal of the much-needed vaccines through 2021.

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GSK CEO Emma Walmsley elaborated that this joint medical venture by the two prominent pharmaceutical companies has a goal of hastening the production of a vaccine that could protect the whole population.

In the collaboration, Sanofi will use its S-protein antigen to formulate the vaccine, whose response would be improved by GSK's adjuvant technology. With this intention, the companies will be using the same technology to produce the same type of protein that is found on the virus's surface.

Sanofi CEO Paul Hudson also had this to say about the collaboration:

"As the world faces this unprecedented global health crisis, it is clear that no one company can go it alone," he said. "That is why Sanofi is continuing to complement its expertise and resources with our peers, such as GSK, with the goal to create and supply sufficient quantities of vaccines that will help stop this virus."

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The pharmaceutical duo plans to start the first phase of their clinical trials in the second half of this year. If successful, they are expecting to roll out their development by the second half of next year.   

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