French company Valneva and IDT Biologika have partnered to manufacture the former’s inactivated vaccine candidate, VLA2001, for Covid-19.

The latest move follows an advance purchase agreement signed by Valneva with the European Commission for the supply of up to 60 million doses of its Covid-19 vaccine candidate over two years.

Under the terms of the partnership, IDT Biologika will be responsible for manufacturing drug substance for VLA2001 at its facilities located in Dessau-Ro?lau, Germany, and Valneva’s manufacturing site situated in Livingston, Scotland.

Subject to the European Medicines Agency (EMA) approval, the vaccine delivery is expected to begin in April next year.

The EMA is anticipated to commence a rolling review of the Covid-19 vaccine candidate in the coming days.

In October this year, the company reported positive top line results from the Phase III trial of its vaccine candidate.

Valneva CEO Thomas Lingelbach said: “IDT is a well-established partner within Valneva’s manufacturing network. As such we are extremely pleased to extend this partnership to supply VLA2001.

“This collaboration will help ensure our inactivated vaccine is available for rapid deployment as we continue to believe that our differentiated vaccine candidate can make an important contribution to the global fight against the Covid-19 pandemic.”

The company stated that it continued to review its product strategy after talks with the UK government and termination of the UK contract in September this year.

It also plans a combination of external and internal VLA2001 production and will continue to review production plans depending on the demand.

The whole virus, adjuvanted vaccine candidate is intended for active immunisation of at-risk populations for the prevention of carriage and symptomatic Covid-19 infection.