Providence licenses mRNA technology to China’s Everest in $100-million deal

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Calgary-based Providence Therapeutics struck a $100-million deal with China’s Everest Medicines Ltd. Monday that will see its technology licensed to the Shanghai-based firm to make and sell its mRNA vaccine candidates in emerging markets in Asia including China and Pakistan.

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Providence founder and chief executive Brad Sorenson said that China has been relying so far on non-mRNA vaccines and that the country requires medicines sold in China to also be manufactured there. Other companies, including BioNTech are in the game there, but Sorenson noted that the company that developed the COVID-19 vaccine heavyweight forged its China plans before teaming up with New York-based partner Pfizer Inc.

While Providence is only now undertaking phase 2 clinical trials for its COVID-19 vaccine, Sorenson said the company is pursuing multiple tracks to recruit candidates and complete the crucial phase 3 trials.

As for catching up with competition, he said North America provides a distorted picture of the market for mRNA vaccines, suggesting that the “hefty upfront” cash injection from Everest speaks to the appetite for candidates that show promise.

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The reality is, sure, it feels like everything’s going swimmingly in North America … but that’s not what’s happening around the world

Brad Sorenson

“The reality is, sure, it feels like everything’s going swimmingly in North America … but that’s not what’s happening around the world,” he said.

Based on the data so far, Providence says its vaccine candidate is generally safe and well tolerated and that subjects have high neutralization titers against the original strain of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. The sera from vaccinated subjects also had high neutralization titers against current variants of concern including Delta “that compare favorably to currently approved mRNA vaccines.”

The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine received full approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in August, while Moderna’s was approved for emergency use last December.

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Sorenson acknowledged that it is getting more difficult to recruit candidates for trials as vaccine uptake improves but the company is looking beyond North America. Negotiations are under way with India’s Biological E. for manufacturing, and there is potential trial recruitment in that country, he said.

As part of the agreements struck this week with Everest, Providence has secured rights to stock and profit sharing totalling up to $400 million, plus royalties, if certain milestones are met.

“(It’s) a fair balance between upfront and back end,” Sorenson said.

The funding injection from the Everest deal will help Providence return to earlier research on using the targeted RNA messenger technology (mRNA) to treat cancer, and ramp up production in Canada, he said.

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Providence struck a “fill/finish” drug manufacturing agreement in February with Winnipeg-based Emergent BioSolutions Inc. for its mRNA COVID-19 vaccine candidate, and the Manitoba government agreed to purchase two million doses.  The company also partnered with Alberta’s Northern RNA to secure raw materials for its vaccine candidate.

Canada was slower than the United States and the United Kingdom in rolling out COVID-19 vaccines earlier this year because it had no domestic vaccine manufacturing and had to import Pfizer/BioNTech, Moderna, Astra-Zeneca and Johnson & Johnson vaccines.

The federal government faced further criticism over a March agreement to inject $415 million to help Sanofi build a new vaccine production facility in Toronto because the pharmaceutical giant does not use mRNA technology.

In August, Ottawa signed a memorandum of understanding with Moderna that includes a plan for the mRNA COVID-19 vaccine maker to set up a manufacturing facility in Canada.