Moderna and Thermo Fisher Scientific announce 15-year mRNA manufacturing deal

24-Feb-2022 - Last updated on 24-Feb-2022 at 10:29 GMT

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Moderna and Thermo Fisher Scientific have announced a 15-year strategic collaboration agreement to enable dedicated large-scale manufacturing of COVID-19 vaccine Spikevax in the US, as well as other investigational mRNA vaccines and therapies.

Over the past several years, Thermo Fisher has been partnering with Moderna to support its development pipeline with both clinical research and contract manufacturing services.

This has included the quick scale-up of aseptic fill-finish services and packaging of the Spikevax COVID-19 vaccine from Thermo Fisher’s Greenville, North Carolina site.

The new long-term agreement will see Thermo Fisher provide dedicated capacity for a range of aseptic fill-finish services including lyophilized and liquid filling; as well as inspection, labeling and final packaging services. Manufacturing will continue to take place from the Greenville site.

“Thermo Fisher continues to be a trusted partner, bringing a full range of products and services that have enabled us to deliver innovative medicines at an unprecedented speed and scale,” said Juan Andres, Moderna's chief technical operations and quality officer. “We are pleased to further expand our collaboration with Thermo Fisher as a long-term manufacturing partner that will enable us to continue to build on our mRNA platform and pipeline.”

"Moderna’s innovation in mRNA technology has been pivotal in the global response to the pandemic and we are proud and privileged to support Moderna over the last decade,” added Michel Lagarde, executive vice president and chief operating officer of Thermo Fisher Scientific. “In expanding our strategic partnership, Moderna will further leverage our scale and depth of capabilities to continue to transform its mRNA platform and bring new breakthrough medicines to patients around the world."

Moderna scaled up manufacturing of its COVID-19 vaccines through a series of partnerships: such as with Catalent and Thermo Fisher in the US; and Lonza and Samsung Biologics outside the US. These are now being expanded into longer-term partnerships.

In April, Moderna and Catalent announced a long-term strategic collaboration for dedicated vial filling of the COVID-19 vaccine and potentially other investigational programs from Catalent’s biologics facility in Bloomington, Indiana.

In 2020, Moderna and Lonza announced a 10 year strategic collaboration for Spikevax and additional products in the future.