Media Release by Vaxxas
Vaxxas, a clinical-stage biotechnology company commercializing a novel vaccination platform, has announced it has completed a financing round which raised US$23 million (A$34 million) in new funds.
This investment round was led by existing investors OneVentures and UniQuest Pty Ltd. New investors include members of the Vaxxas Board of Directors, management team, and a number of individual investors.
Proceeds from the financing will be used to advance Vaxxas’ clinical programs, including the company’s needle-free COVID-19 vaccine candidate, and installation of the company’s first manufacturing lines with capacity to support its first products through late-stage clinical studies as well as early commercial production.
“Our confidence has only been reinforced by Vaxxas’ tremendous progress in building a promising clinical pipeline based on its novel HD-MAP vaccination platform,” revealed Dr Paul Kelly, Founding Partner and Head of Healthcare at OneVentures. “We believe Vaxxas’ needle-free vaccination technology will dramatically improve the availability, efficacy, and safety of vaccines for a range of serious and prevalent diseases, including COVID-19 and influenza. We are pleased to continue supporting the Vaxxas team through this pivotal time in the company’s growth – as it applies a breakthrough approach to address some of the most significant unmet global needs in infectious and potentially other diseases.”
The financing will accelerate the clinical program for Vaxxas’ COVID-19 vaccine patch candidate which is currently in Phase I clinical trials and is based upon the company’s proprietary HD-MAP delivery of HexaPro, a second-generation version of the spike protein used in all major US-approved COVID-19 vaccines. Results from preclinical animal studies of HD-MAP-delivered HexaPro published in Science Advances, showed the potential efficacy of this COVID-19 vaccine patch against all currently known variants of concern.
“This financing from a strong syndicate of experienced life science investors reflects the significant potential of our considerable product pipeline and novel needle-free vaccination technology,” said David Hoey, Chief Executive Officer of Vaxxas. “With a strong foundation to our HD-MAP platform, we are well positioned to advance multiple product opportunities toward commercial launch. In the near-term, we will continue to advance our lead COVID-19 vaccine program along with other clinical initiatives, and execute our go-to-market strategy of building commercial-scale manufacturing capacity and high throughput production lines.”
This US$23 million (A$34 million) in new funding will leverage non-dilutive financial support of more than US$67 million (A$100 million) which has been provided and committed to Vaxxas under contracts with US and Australian government agencies, including US Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA), industry collaborators, and global health organizations, including the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
