Panacea Biotec Ltd. (PBL) is delighted to announce the collaboration with signing of two long term agreements with Serum Institute of India Pvt. Ltd. (SII) and SII’s wholly owned subsidiary, Bilthovan Biologicals B.V. (BBIO). Under the collaboration SII is entitled to manufacture & sell fully liquid Whole cell Pertussis (wP) and Salk based Injectable Polio Vaccine (IPV) based Hexavalent vaccine (DTwP-HepB-Hib-IPV) developed & commercialized by Panacea Biotec, a first of its kind in this category.
Under the collaboration, broadly the following will be achieved:
- Serum Institute of India will ensure supply of IPV bulk to Panacea Biotec, an important constituent of the Hexavalent vaccine, from its wholly owned subsidiary BBIO, a bioengineering and pharmaceutical company, registered in The Netherlands having technology and expertise for making the IPV, earlier possessed by only 3 other vaccine manufacturers in the World.
- In next 2 years both SII and PBL will work together to get this wP-IPV based Hexavalent Vaccine introduced in the National Immunization Program of Government of India and developing countries by working closely with key stakeholders including but not limited to National Governments, World Health Organization (WHO), Global Alliance for Vaccines & Immunization (GAVI), Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) and other United Nation Agencies, etc.
Speaking on the occasion Dr Rajesh Jain, Joint Managing Director, Panacea Biotec said that millions of children in developing countries with an annual birth cohort of approx. 121 Million will get an easy access to a fully liquid Hexavalent vaccine containing six very important antigens to protect against six dreaded diseases i.e. Diphtheria, Tetanus, Pertussis, Hepatitis B, Haemophilus influenza type B & Polio. Dr. Rajesh Jain added that it is the first fully liquid wP-IPV based hexavalent vaccine in the World which Panacea Biotec has developed making India proud under Government of India’s Make in India Program and currently being marketed in India under brand name EasySixTM.
WHO prequalified IPV is essential to successfully eradicating Polio across the globe, an effort that has already cost $ 20 Billion worldwide. There is a Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) in place & Global Alliance for Vaccine Initiative (GAVI) has been supporting the program since 2013 having allocated $430 Million till 2018 with an additional donor pledge of $23 Million for 2019. At present GAVI is evaluating IPV under Vaccine Investment Strategy for Global Public Good.
Global demand of IPV/ IPV containing vaccines is estimated to rise significantly from ~100 Million in the year 2020 till supply constraints remain, to 250-350 Million doses every year starting 2022 depending upon a two or three dose schedule as Strategic Advisory Group of Experts (SAGE) on Immunization in April 2017 has recommended at least 2 doses of IPV in the routine Immunization schedule of the countries post OPV withdrawal.
Here it is important to note that there has been a global supply constraint of IPV since early 2015 and only 52% of projected supply had been delivered to UN agencies as a result of which 18 Countries could not introduce IPV in their immunization & 15 had interruptions out of 70 IPV eligible countries approved for GAVI support.
A beaming Mr Adar C. Poonawalla, C.E.O. & Executive Director, Serum Institute of India, said, “It is an historic deal where in two major vaccine Companies in India have come forward to join hands to address unmet needs of both Private & Public Market globally. With the convenience of ‘Six in one’ it has potential of over 250 million doses in next 3-4 years with a market size of over $1.25 Billion annually.”
Mr R K Suri, Senior Advisor, who orchestrated the mega deal between two big Vaccine players said, “It marks beginning of a new Era in vaccine landscape and heralds a new business model, ‘Collaborate yet Compete!’.”
About Panacea Biotec
Panacea Biotec Limited is a leading research based biotechnology company with established research, manufacturing and marketing capabilities. It is one of the largest vaccine producers and Biotechnology Companies in India.
Panacea Biotec is the first company to have developed World’s first fully-liquid Quadravalent Vaccine Easyfour-TT (DTwP-Hib) Pentavalent Vaccine Easyfive-TT (DTwP-HepB-Hib), monovalent Polio vaccine against Type 1 and Type 3 Polio virus and World’s First Fully Liquid whole cell Pertussis (wP) based Hexavalent Combination Vaccine, EasySix.TM
The Company is also amongst the top 15 pharmaceutical companies (AIOCD AWACS-MAT MAR-2017) in its represented market India and amongst top 60 pharmaceutical Companies in India. The Company has been awarded with the prestigious “India Innovation Award 2016 – Top 50” by Clarivate Analytics.
The product portfolio of includes highly innovative products in therapeutic areas of oncology, organ transplantation, nephrology, diabetes, osteoporosis, cardiovascular diseases and pediatric vaccines. It is working on a robust pipeline of high barrier to entry generics products, thus leveraging its capabilities in the areas of nanotechnology and platform drug delivery technologies like micro-particles, liposomes, gastroretentive systems.
The Company has research collaborations with leading national and international research organizations and corporations. The company’s state-of-the-art manufacturing facilities for vaccines and pharmaceutical formulations comply with several leading regulatory agencies worldwide. The company has around 2,500 employees including around 100 scientists working across 4 R&D centers of the Company.
About Serum Institute of India
Serum Institute of India Pvt. Ltd. is now the world’s largest vaccine manufacturer by number of doses produced and sold globally (more than 1.3 billion doses) which includes Polio vaccine as well as Diphtheria, Tetanus, Pertussis, Hib, BCG, r-Hepatitis B, Measles, Mumps and Rubella vaccines. It is estimated that about 65% of the children in the world receive at least one vaccine manufactured by Serum Institute. Vaccines manufactured by the Serum Institute are accredited by the World Health Organization, Geneva and are being used in around 170 countries across the globe in their national immunization programs, saving millions of lives throughout the world.
Serum Institute of India is ranked as India’s No. 1 biotechnology company, manufacturing highly specialized lifesaving biologicals like vaccines using cutting edge genetic and cell based technologies, antisera and other medical specialties.
Serum Institute of India was founded in 1966 by Dr. Cyrus Poonawalla with the aim of manufacturing life-saving immuno-biologicals, which were in shortage in the country and imported at high prices. Thereafter, several life-saving biologicals were manufactured at prices affordable to the common man and in abundance, with the result that the country was made self-sufficient for Tetanus Anti-toxin and Anti-snake Venom serum, followed by DTP (Diphtheria, Tetanus and Pertussis) group of Vaccines and then later on MMR (Measles, Mumps and Rubella) group of vaccines.
The Philanthropic philosophy of the company still not only exists but has been proliferated to bring down the prices of newer vaccines such as Hepatitis-B vaccine, Combination vaccine etc., so that not only Indian’s, but the entire under-privileged children of the world are protected from birth onwards.
