On Jun. 11, 2020, Emergent BioSolutions announced deployment of its molecule-to-market contract development and manufacturing (CDMO) services to support the manufacturing of AstraZeneca’s vaccine candidate for COVID-19, AZD1222, a viral vector-based, weakened version of adenovirus containing the genetic material of SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, developed by Oxford Universityﾒs Jenner institute working with the Oxford Vaccine Group.

AstraZeneca’s AZD1222 is one of several candidates supported by Operation Warp Speed (OWS), the U.S. government’s program to accelerate the development, manufacturing, and distribution of COVID-19 medical countermeasures that aims to have substantial quantities of a safe and effective vaccine available for Americans by January 2021 . As part of OWS, Emergent will provide development and manufacturing services and capacity to innovators of leading COVID-19 vaccine candidates selected by the U.S. government, such as AstraZeneca.

Under the agreement, valued at approximately $87 million, Emergent will provide development services, technology transfer, analytical testing, drug substance process and performance qualification and will reserve certain large-scale manufacturing capacity through 2020.

Development services will be provided out of Emergent’s Gaithersburg product development facility. Large-scale manufacturing of drug substance will be done at the Baltimore Bayview facility, an HHS-designated Center for Innovation in Advanced Development and Manufacturing (CIADM) designed for rapid manufacturing of large quantities of vaccines and treatments during public health emergencies.

Emergent’s Bayview facility has unique capabilities across four independent suites to produce at clinical scale to get candidates rapidly into the clinic, while at the same time scaling up to enable large-scale manufacturing to up to 4000L to prepare for production of commercial volumes to meet customer demand. The CIADM has the capacity to produce tens to hundreds of millions of doses of vaccine on an annual basis, based upon the platform technology being used.