J&J pares down vaccine partnership with Bavarian Nordic

Johnson & Johnson on Monday announced the termination of its collaboration and license agreements with Bavarian Nordic to develop potential vaccines against the hepatitis B virus and human papillomaviruses (HPV). However, it said the two companies remain partnered on HIV and Ebola programmes. Johnson & Johnson entered an agreement in 2015 potentially worth $171 million to get exclusive rights to Bavarian Nordic's MVA-BN technology to develop a prime-boost vaccine regimen, together with its own AdVac technology, targeting all HPV-induced cancers. The pair broadened their tie-up about two years later to develop vaccine regimens against hepatitis B and HIV in a deal valued up to $879 million. On Monday, Johnson & Johnson noted that it has not initiated any clinical studies in hepatitis B using the MVA-BN platform. However, the company said its Janssen Pharmaceutical unit would "continue to prioritise investigation of its hepatitis B combination therapies using alternative investigational vaccine platforms and therapeutics within its portfolio," with several studies under way. It also pointed out that there has been "widespread uptake" of vaccines against HPV. As a result of this, and the "prioritisation of other programmes, Janssen will not be focusing R&D efforts on a therapeutic vaccine against human papillomaviruses at this time," the company said. Meanwhile, the Ebola collaboration dates back in 2014, when Johnson & Johnson obtained an exclusive license to Bavarian Nordic's MVA-BN-based Filovirus vaccine, designed to protect against the Zaire and Sudan strains of Ebola virus as well as Marburg virus. That deal was worth in excess of $187 million. Last year, Phase III results from the EBOVAC-Salone study showed that Johnson & Johnson's Ebola vaccine regimen, which comprises Zabdeno (Ad26.ZEBOV) and Mvabea (MVA-BN-Filo), provided "robust" immune response in adults and children, with antibody responses persisting for at least two years in adults.

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