BioNTech Annual General Meeting Vaccine effective against mutants

Status: 06/22/2021 6:13 p.m.

BioNTech boss Sahin uses the vaccine manufacturer’s general meeting to spread good news: Production will be increased and the vaccine also protects against virus variants. In view of the growing spread of the delta variant of the coronavirus, which is considered to be more dangerous, many people are wondering how the effectiveness of the various vaccines is doing in this regard. At today’s Annual General Meeting, CEO Ugur Sahin gave the all-clear for BioNTech’s product: “There is currently no evidence that our vaccine needs to be adapted to the variants in circulation,” he said. That does not mean that the company is stopping development: According to Sahin, BioNTech is working on flexible processes in the areas of technology, production and approval.

Constant analysis

In order to be prepared and to be able to react quickly if a third dose should be required to boost existing vaccinations or to adapt to a new virus strain, BioNTech constantly analyzes the effectiveness of the vaccine against newly emerging variants, the CEO explained.

Sahin also commented on the subject of booster vaccinations: It is not yet known when and how often a booster will be necessary. But he assumes “that a third vaccination is of great value for boosting immunity,” said Sahin. Knowledge about the corona virus is steadily increasing. “We observe that immunity will decrease over time and new variants will emerge.”

Sahin against patent release

The one raised by US President Joe Biden and other politicians Request for the release of patents to enable license-free vaccine production in developing countries, the BioNTech boss rejected. It is important to be able to make the vaccine available worldwide “as quickly and as comprehensively as possible”. However, raw materials are currently the “limiting factor”, not patents.

BioNTech is working with partners to deliver the vaccine cheaply to developing countries. However, a patent release would not bring additional amounts of vaccine. The production of the vaccine is very complex and consists of around 50,000 work steps.

Production is increased

During the Annual General Meeting, Sahin also commented on production: The BioNTech boss confirmed that the company, together with its US partner Pfizer, is aiming for a production capacity of up to three billion vaccine doses this year.

In the coming year 2022 it should be more than three billion. BioNTech will manufacture at least half of this. To date, BioNTech and Pfizer have shipped more than 700 million doses of their Covid-19 vaccine to over 100 countries worldwide.

Dividend is possible

The shareholders should also benefit from the billions in sales generated with the corona vaccine. Chief Financial Officer Sierk Poetting said that in the next financial year it should be checked whether and in what amount a dividend is possible.

However, the strategic priority for 2021 is the reinvestment of the capital in order to further advance innovations in various therapeutic areas and technologies as well as our corporate development, said Poetting. The Mainz biotechnology company achieved a net profit of 1.1 billion euros on sales of 2.05 billion euros in the first quarter of this year .

New production facilities

There was also news from BioNTech outside of the Annual General Meeting. The European Medicines Agency’s Committee on Medicinal Products for Human Use gives the go-ahead for two more production facilities to manufacture the joint corona vaccine from Biontech and Pfizer.

One becomes accordingly in Reinbek, Schleswig-Holstein, operated by Allergopharma, the parent company of Dermapharm , the other in the Swiss stone from Novartis Pharma. The work can be started immediately, since no approval from the EU Commission is required

BioNTech Annual General Meeting Successful with mRNA technology

Status: 22.06.2021 10:25 a.m.

At today’s Annual General Meeting, the BioNTech top management can boast great successes. This is not only due to the corona vaccine, in which the company has left many competitors behind.

From Bianca von der Au, ARD stock exchange studio

What happened to the Tübingen-based vaccine manufacturer CureVac is actually the norm in the biotech industry: one drug candidate disappoints. Research is tedious and devours billions. The rapid success of the competitor BioNTech was more than a stroke of luck, believes asset manager Hendrik Leber from the private corporation Acatis. The Mainz biotech company did a lot of things right, he says. “BioNTech made the decision very quickly to develop a vaccine at all. And the choice of partner to work with Pfizer was an extremely good decision.” The US pharmaceutical company opened the door to the American market and at the same time pushed ahead with marketing and clinical studies at a rapid pace.

Does CureVac’s chance lie in the mutants?

The Tübingen competitor CureVac is not only lagging in terms of time, but also in terms of time Effectiveness of his vaccine after. Experts are divided as to whether this deficit can be made up at all. Pharmaceutical specialist Alexander Nuyken from the consulting company EY gives the race is not lost for CureVac – in view of the constant number of new mutations and a low vaccination rate among the world’s population.

mRNA vaccine with great potential

However, the EY expert sees enormous potential in biotechnology, especially in the field, beyond the corona vaccine novel mRNA technology , which CureVac is also researching. “It was originally not developed with Covid in mind, but for completely different therapies, such as cancer”recalls Nuyken. There is the potential to address other diseases with this technology, namely, according to the expert, “cheaper, faster and more efficient.”

There is great hope – not only among investors – that mRNA technology can develop effective agents against previously incurable diseases – not only against cancer, but also against Alzheimer’s, for example. BioNTech has been researching a vaccine against cancer for a long time and, a few days ago, treated a skin cancer patient with an mRNA vaccine for the first time in a phase II study.

Would you like more willingness to take risks?

The path to the surprising success with the corona vaccine was only possible for BioNTech thanks to patient donors in the background. EY pharma expert Nuyken believes that there is a need for greater willingness to take risks in Germany. “How do we get the good science that we undoubtedly have in Germany in companies? And how can we then further develop these companies until they are ready for the market?”the expert asks.

He sees this as the biggest hurdle in the German environment. “In contrast to the American market, we have significantly less capital that is available for the development of these companies.” So it’s no wonder that CureVac and BioNTech have been listed on the Nasdaq technology exchange in the USA in the past two years. But also in Germany, Corona and the search for a vaccine have put the biotech industry in the (spotlight) light. According to EY, the German biotechnology company is in the Corona year 2020 so much capital flowed in as never before . In CureVac, the federal government even invested 300 million euros – a risky investment

From Michael Heussen, WDR The apparent contradiction between accepted genetic engineering in the medical field and the controversial so-called green genetic engineering in agriculture was the topic of the run-up to the Bayer Group’s Annual General Meeting today. The discussion was held by Klaus Müller, Member of the Board of Directors of the consumer association, and Matthias Berninger, chief lobbyist at Bayer. Both sat together as young MPs for the Greens in the Bundestag in the 1990s before they parted ways. Now they were invited to the virtual Bayer podium together.

Waiting for the CureVac vaccine

Bayer has entered into a cooperation with the Tübingen vaccine developer CureVac. The vaccine is to be brought onto the market at the end of the year. The goal is to produce 160 million vaccine doses in the coming year, said Berninger, including at the Bayer plant in Wuppertal. This is new territory for the pharmaceutical giant, which has not yet produced any human vaccines. 40,000 test subjects have been recruited for clinical phase III, explained Florian von der Mülbe, CureVac’s Chief Production Officer: “We are about to complete the study and assume that we will be able to apply for approval in the second quarter.” The study is running in ten countries in Europe, Central and South America; half of the subjects received the vaccine, the other half a placebo. So far there have been no significant adverse reactions, according to the head of the study, Peter Kremsner from the Tübingen Tropical Institute. To answer the question why you are so late compared to other vaccine manufacturers, Berninger reached deep into the phrase box: “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best is today.” Von der Mülbe added that you have to be prepared for future pandemics, and that is what his company is doing: They have developed a technology that, together with the production capacities provided by Bayer, can react quickly to mutations and disease outbreaks.

Many people come across glyphosate and green genetic engineering

Bayer not only stands for the pharmaceutical sector, but has also been criticized – since the purchase of the American Monsanto group, producer of the controversial weed killer glyphosate and genetically modified seeds. Bayer spokesman Christian Maertin defends himself by asking the head of the consumer advice center why genetic engineering in the medical field is widely accepted by the population, but why green genetic engineering, which is used in agriculture, is met with so much suspicion. “As a consumer center, we have the privilege not to be for or against, but to demand responsible regulation,” replied consumer advocate Müller. It is about risk assessment, but also about retrievability. Adjacent fields should not be impaired, you have to respect the fact that many would like to live without genetic engineering: “I don’t think Bayer can see that any differently,” said Müller. Not every end justifies the means: “That is why strict approval procedures and transparency are important. I would like Bayer to commit to the precautionary principle” – that is, pollution and damage to the environment and health are avoided or reduced in advance. Müller also pointed out the mortgage, which Bayer took over with the purchase of Monsanto : Compensation payments that – in addition to the purchase price of 60 billion euros – will amount to at least a further twelve billion euros and that will damage the company’s reputation. In response to the somewhat helpless objection of the Bayer spokesman that it has been proven that green genetic engineering does no harm and that small companies are hindered by regulation, Müller drew attention to the legal disputes in the USA: Only large companies are able to do this To conduct litigation and pay such sums of money. “Not every little scrap should be able to experiment with the most important thing that we as humanity have” – ​​with food.

Sorry to the shareholders

The dramatic impact that underestimating these questions has on Bayer became clear at the subsequent Annual General Meeting. CEO Werner Baumann apologized to the shareholders for the bad stock market price: “We bear the responsibility – without ifs or buts. That is why it is important for me to emphasize right from the start: We want to regain your trust.” The vaccine against Covid-19 is a perfect example of how to move forward with new technologies and global collaboration on the big issues of the time. However, it is currently not foreseeable that the cooperation with CureVac will boost the company’s figures in the current financial year. According to several analysts, Bayer remains a candidate for a hostile takeover because of its low market value. The group is bottom of the DAX and has made a loss of more than ten billion euros. And in the context of the Annual General Meeting, the question is also raised as to whether Baumann will fulfill his contract, which runs until 2024 – or should resign early.