Chikungunya Vaccine Maker Valneva Secures Non Dilutive Funding To Develop/Expand Its Clinical Pipeline

Valneva SE VALN, on Monday, sold the FDA Priority Review Voucher (PRV) for $103 million (€95 million).

The company was awarded a tropical disease PRV in November 2023 following the FDA approval of Ixchiq, Valneva’s single-dose, live-attenuated vaccine indicated for the prevention of disease caused by chikungunya virus in individuals 18 years of age and older who are at increased risk of exposure to the mosquito-borne infection.

With this approval, Ixchiq became the world’s first licensed chikungunya vaccine.

Valneva will invest proceeds from the sale of the PRV into its R&D projects, including the co-development of its Phase 3 vaccine candidate against Lyme disease, additional clinical trials for its chikungunya vaccine Ixchiq and the expansion of the company’s clinical pipeline.

Also Read: Pfizer, Valneva’s Tick-Borne Infection Shot: Companies Say ‘Positive’ Result For Lyme Disease Vaccine Candidate Booster.

Thomas Lingelbach, Chief Executive Officer of Valneva, said, “This non-dilutive capital provides an important source of additional funding to advance the continued development of our clinical pipeline.”

In December, Valneva reported antibody persistence data 24 months after vaccination with a single dose of its chikungunya vaccine, further supporting the anticipated long-term durability of the immune response and in line with positive twelve-month persistence data the company reported in December 2022.

97% of the 316 healthy adults still enrolled in the trial retained neutralizing antibody titers above the seroresponse threshold2 twenty-four months after the single-dose vaccination. 

The persistence of antibodies in older adults aged 65 and above was as robust as in younger adults and even slightly higher in terms of geometric mean titers and seroconversion rates. 

The tropical disease PRV program is intended to encourage the development of new drugs and biologics to prevent/treat tropical diseases.

While mortality with chikungunya is low, morbidity is high, and the global market for vaccines against chikungunya is estimated to exceed $500 million annually by 2032.

Read Next: Bavarian Nordic Beefs Up Chikungunya Vaccine Race With Valneva With Encouraging Late-Stage Trial Data.

Price Action: VALN shares are down 1.11% at $8.00 premarket on the last check Monday.

Photo by Wolfgang Hasselmann on Unsplash