Valneva received a 20 million pound sterling ($27 million) grant from Scottish Enterprise for the development of its Livingston, Scotland, manufacturing site where the biotech is working on a COVID-19 vaccine.
The investment will be parceled out in two tranches over the next three years, with 12.5 million pounds ( $16.9 million) targeting research and development related to the manufacture of the company’s inactivated, whole virus COVID-19 vaccine candidate (VLA2002) and 7.5 million pounds ($10 million) for the manufacturing processes of other vaccines.
Valneva is also working on a single-shot vaccine to treat mosquito-borne viral infection chikungunya (VLA1553) that will be produced at the Livingston facility. Last year, the company reported positive top-line phase 3 results for both vaccine candidates.
“This investment bolsters Valneva’s longstanding relationship with Scottish Enterprise as well as our position at the forefront of life sciences and vaccine development in Scotland,” Thomas Lingelbach, Valneva’s chief executive, said in a statement.
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The biotech’s COVID candidate incorporates a CpG 1018 adjuvant from Dynavax. The vaccine doesn’t have stringent cold-chain requirements and has a longer shelf life than current mRNA vaccines being used to battle the pandemic, allowing countries to more easily stockpile the treatment.
Valneva has a five-year supply deal with the U.K. worth $1.63 billion that could eventually bring in 190 million doses by 2025.