Business Strategy

Our goal is to maximize the potential of our innovative alphavaccine technology and realize the growth potential of the vaccine marketplace through a mixture of in-house and partnered programs. Our main strategy to achieve these goals is to:

(1) Establish proprietary manufacturing expertise and capability

We employ our product design and development know-how with our proprietary cost-efficient manufacturing processes to accelerate product development and clinical trials, facilitating partnerships and enhancing their value. We have a strong development team with expertise in process development, manufacturing, and regulatory affairs, and GMP-compliant clinical trial material production capability at our leased vaccine facility in Lenoir, North Carolina. This facility has capacity to produce sufficient materials for phase I and phase II trials. Our development team is adapting the process to modular and disposable technologies to allow for efficient transition to Phase III and commercial launch capability.

(2) Develop a broad product pipeline

In-house Programs

We are currently advancing three in-house infectious disease product programs for Herpes Simplex Virus (HSV), Respiratory Syncytial virus (RSV) and Influenza. Each of these disease targets has multiple indications: HSV has both therapeutic and prophylactic applications; RSV vaccines are needed for both the elderly and the pediatric populations, and improved influenza vaccines are needed for the pandemic threat and the elderly. We are advancing at least one of these indications for each disease through mid- to late-stage clinical development, while continuing to assess the opportunities for co-development and/or out-licensing.

Partnered programs

The attraction, as well as the challenge, for a product platform such as the alphavaccine system is the potential breadth of applications. We are focused today on identifying partners that can help us extend the applications for this platform to other infectious disease and tumor immunotherapy fields.

• Corporate Partners

  We are looking for partners who will deploy our platform to advance products on either a disease-specific or an antigen-specific basis. Our current partnership with Novartis is a disease-specific license; our current partnership with Progenics Pharmaceuticals is focused on a prostate cancer antigen, PSMA.
  
  

• Government-funded Collaborations

  Our extensive research and database developed through our biodefense grant programs presents us with the potential to enter into procurement contracts with government agencies based on accelerated product approval strategies. We are very interested in providing our platform and expertise to address bioterror and emerging disease threats throughout the world.