Serum Institute of India (SII) today (Aug 7) said it has entered into a new partnership with international vaccine alliance Gavi and Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to accelerate manufacturing and delivery of up to 100 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines.
The company has set an affordable ceiling price of about £2.29 per dose.
"The collaboration will provide upfront capital to SII to help them increase manufacturing capacity now so that, once a vaccine, or vaccines, gains regulatory approval and WHO prequalification, doses can be produced at scale for distribution," SII said in a statement.
The funding will support at-risk manufacturing by SII for candidate vaccines from AstraZeneca and Novavax, which will be available for procurement if they are successful in attaining full licensure and WHO prequalification, the statement said.
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, via its Strategic Investment Fund, will provide at-risk funding of about £115 million to Gavi, which will be used to support SII to manufacture the potential vaccine candidates and for future procurement of vaccines for low-and middle-income countries via Gavi's COVAX Advance Market Commitment (AMC), the statement added.
"In an attempt to make our fight against Covid-19 stronger and all-embracing; SII has partnered with Gavi and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to advance the manufacturing and delivery of up to 100 million doses of future Covid vaccines for India and low- and middle-income countries in 2021," Serum Institute of India CEO Adar Poonawalla said.
Through this association, SII seeks to ramp up constant efforts to save the lives of millions of people from this dreadful disease, he added.
Serum Institute has a long history of partnerships with Gavi and pharmaceutical companies to manufacture vaccines that protect against meningitis, severe diarrhoea, pneumonia and measles, the statement said.
