AstraZeneca partners with VaxEquity in RNA deal
AstraZeneca PLC updates
Sign up to myFT Daily Digest to be the first to know about AstraZeneca PLC news.
AstraZeneca has agreed its first major deal in RNA, signing a partnership with VaxEquity to create therapeutics using the technology that first proved itself with Covid-19 vaccines.
The UK drugmaker will commercialise up to 26 drug targets using VaxEquity’s self-amplifying RNA, based on innovations developed at Imperial College London. RNA, which stands for ribonucleic acid, translates genetic code into proteins.
AstraZeneca is taking a stake in the company in a deal that includes up to $195m in milestone payments plus royalties. Morningside Group, the science and technology fund that was an original investor, increased its investment.
Mene Pangalos, executive vice-president at AstraZeneca, said the Covid-19 vaccines had reduced some of the previous scepticism about the technology.
While AstraZeneca was an early collaborator and investor in Moderna — a programme to use messenger RNA, a subset of RNA that translates the instructions to make proteins, to regenerate tissue after a heart attack is currently in phase 2 trials — the VaxEquity partnership will give it much broader access to RNA development.
“We feel having access to our own mRNA platform to use in all of our therapy areas is important,” Pangalos told the Financial Times, adding it could be used in oncology, respiratory diseases and infectious diseases.
Pharmaceutical companies including Sanofi and GlaxoSmithKline are rushing to invest in RNA platforms after the success of Covid vaccines using mRNA developed by BioNTech and Pfizer, and Moderna. These mRNA pioneers have ambitions to use it for vaccines against other infectious diseases and to treat cancer.
VaxEquity, which was co-founded last year by Professor Robin Shattock, head of mucosal infection and immunity at Imperial College London, is developing a version of RNA that could allow it to create longer-lasting proteins that can be used to treat diseases and design vaccines that would be effective at lower doses.
Imperial tried to use this self-amplifying RNA to create a Covid vaccine last year, but as other vaccines won approval, it changed tack to focus on developing a jab for variants or boosters. Shattock said earlier this year that its technology was at an earlier stage than Oxford’s when the pandemic hit and it received less funding.
AstraZeneca, which developed its Covid vaccine with Oxford university using a different technology called an adenovirus vector, will work with VaxEquity on research and development.
Pangalos said: “We believe self-amplifying RNA, once optimised, will allow us to target novel pathways not amenable to traditional drug discovery across our therapy areas of interest.”
Shattock said the prospect of more therapeutic applications “adds to the technology’s great potential”.
“We have all seen how technologies based around RNA have been fundamental to preventing ongoing severe disease and death in major global pandemics,” he said.