PR Newswire -- July 22, 2008
ATLANTA and NANTES, France, July 22 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- GeoVax Labs, Inc. (OTC Bulletin Board: GOVX), an Atlanta based, biopharmaceutical company developing human vaccines for diseases caused by HIV-1 (Human Immunodeficiency Virus) and other infectious agents, together with Vivalis (NYSE Euronext: VLS), a French biopharmaceutical company that provides innovative cell-based solutions to the pharmaceutical industry for the manufacture of vaccines and proteins, announced today the signing of a letter of intent (LOI) for joint collaboration and commercial license on the use of Vivalis' EBx(R) technology, to manufacture the MVA component of the GeoVax HIV-1 vaccine.
This agreement between GeoVax and Vivalis creates a worldwide strategic partnership between Vivalis and GeoVax, designed to combine Vivalis'
cutting-edge vaccine manufacturing technology with GeoVax's promising HIV vaccine.
The breakthrough manufacturing technology developed by Vivalis, and now to be further developed through collaboration with GeoVax, will create a new standard for manufacture of the MVA component of the GeoVax HIV/AIDS vaccine, making present manufacturing technologies which have limited production capabilities, less competitive. Vivalis' EBx(R) manufacturing platform, with its increased effectiveness, superior quality and reliability, will speed time to market MVA vaccine product availability in ample quantities to meet sizeable demand and expectedly at a lesser cost.
"Partnering with Vivalis and its cutting-edge technology is extremely significant, and a giant step forward for efficient manufacturing of our 'MVA' HIV/AIDS vaccine component," stated Robert McNally, President and CEO, GeoVax.
"Vivalis is pleased to enter in this collaboration with GeoVax, one of the most advanced companies worldwide in the field of HIV vaccine development. This agreement aims at developing a Vivalis proprietary upstream-downstream process for the production of MVA vaccines and EBx
(R) technology licensing. GeoVax becomes a strategic partner and joins an elite worldwide consortium in the field of development, purification and production of MVA based vaccines," said Franck Grimaud, Vivalis CEO.
The EB66(R) cell line is becoming a new standard for the production of vaccines, leading to Vivalis having signed more than 20 licenses prior to December 2007 and four licenses in 2008: two research and two commercial.
Vivalis' vaccine manufacturing technology is based on a duck embryonic stem cell substrate platform. The EB66(R) cell line provides continuous growth from a fully characterized frozen cell bank, without necessitating fertilized embryo extraction and processing, as with present chicken cell based technologies. Furthermore, the EB66(R) cell line can be grown in suspension (without the cells attached to the surface of the growth vessel) and can be scaled up for growth in giant bioreactors (a cutting edge industrial method) for large scale production of the MVA viral vaccine.
Last month, Vivalis announced the filing of the BMF (Biologics Master
File) for the EB66(R) cell line with the US FDA (Food and Drug Administration). Extensive testing reveals the unique and innovative nature of Vivalis EBx(R) technology for the production of vaccines and proteins. Today, the EB66(R) cell line is the only available cell line in the market to be immortal and diploid.
"When we learned about the work of Vivalis with EBx(R) cell lines that might be able to be used to grow MVA, we contacted Vivalis and arranged with them to jointly conduct pilot studies on the growth of our MVA vaccine," said Harriet Robinson, Senior Vice President of Research and Development, GeoVax. "Our early production results have been very promising and have led to this LOI for more formal development of the Vivalis EB66(R) cell line for the production of our MVA vaccine."
