On Aug. 5, 2020, Variation Biotechnologies, an Ottawa-based subsidiary of VBI Vaccines, announced that it had been awarded up to a CAD$56 million contribution from the Strategic Innovation Fund of the Government of Canada to support the development of the companyﾒs coronavirus program, VBI-2900, through Phase 2 clinical studies.

Coronaviruses are enveloped viruses by nature, which make them prime targets for VBI’s flexible enveloped virus-like particle (eVLP) platform technology. A multivalent eVLP vaccine candidate, co-expressing SARS-CoV-2, SARS-CoV, and MERS-CoV spike proteins, may enable the immune system’s production of broadly reactive antibodies, potentially offering protection from emerging strains of COVID-19 that evolve over time.

As part of the previously-announced collaboration with the National Research Council of Canada (NRC), a series of three pre-clinical mouse studies initiated in the second quarter of 2020 to evaluate: (1) trivalent vs. monovalent vaccine constructs, (2) multiple different adjuvants, and (3) pre-fusion vs. post-fusion spike proteins. Based on the results of these studies, which are being conducted at both the NRC core facilities and VBI’s research facility in Ottawa, Canada, VBI expects to select the optimal vaccine candidates in the third quarter of 2020 to enable the start of clinical studies by the end of 2020.