With expansion a prime focus for businesses worldwide, many are looking towards rapidly establishing new regions of growth, particularly in Asia, Pacifi c Rim countries.
The latest business developments from across Asia by Heather Hobbs To appear in our next issue, send your Business and Financial News stories to
heather@intlabmate.com
This section of International Labmate will especially look at the success of both Asian and European companies with established premises or business partnerships, highlighting the opportunities that exist while realising potential for other companies to move into export markets.
Europe-wide Expansion to Support Delivery of mRNA Therapies
Biotechnology business Moderna has announced plans to extend its global footprint by establishing a commercial presence in Belgium, Denmark, Norway, the Netherlands, Poland and Sweden, supporting the delivery of mRNA vaccines and therapeutics locally. This follows the recent announcement of plans for four new subsidiaries in Malaysia, Taiwan, Singapore and Hong Kong.
“Europe has played a critical role in Moderna’s ability to manufacture and deliver our COVID-19 vaccine across the world, protecting millions of people from COVID-19 infection, hospitalization, and death. After a decade of pioneering the development of our mRNA platform, I am proud of the growth we continue to achieve,” said Stéphane Bancel, Chief Executive Offi cer of Moderna. “I look forward to furthering our collaborations with European researchers and partners to leverage our mRNA technology and expand treatment options to improve the lives of patients across Europe.”
Existing commercial subsidiaries in Italy, France, Germany, Spain, Switzerland and the United Kingdom were joined by Moderna Poland last year, which hosts the company’s International Business Services (MIBS) Centre, providing critical functions such as fi nance, pharmacovigilance, human resources and digital services. There are also plans to expand its commercial capabilities. Moderna also has several key manufacturing partnerships across Europe, including Lonza in Switzerland and the Netherlands, ROVI in Spain, and Recipharm in France.
As well as continuing to update its COVID-19 strategy to address variants of concern, the company is developing mRNA medicines to potentially prevent and treat diseases with signifi cant unmet needs across infectious diseases, immuno-oncology, rare and ultra-rare diseases, and autoimmune diseases with 25 of 40 development programmes currently in clinical trials.
Regulators have approved Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine in more than 70 countries, including Canada, Japan, the European Union, the UK, and Israel. In 2021, 807 million doses of Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine were shipped globally, with approximately 25% of those doses shipped to low- and middle-income countries.
In the European Union, the Company’s COVID-19 vaccine and booster are approved for use by the European Commission for active immunisation to prevent COVID-19 caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus in individuals 18 years of age and older. To date, the European Commission has ordered 460 million doses of Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine, including boosters and the ability to purchase other COVID-19 vaccine candidates from Moderna’s pipeline.
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A recent agreement between the UK’s Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) and Singapore Space and Technology Limited will see the two organisations working in tandem to support their national space tech start-ups through commercial development and help them reach international markets.
The agreement includes introducing the new companies to potential international investors and market experts across Asia Pacifi c and the UK and encouraging both business partnerships as well as research collaborations that will initiate knowledge transfer and capability building between the two countries.
Other outline agreements include:
UK-based space tech start-ups to be considered for Singapore Space and Technology Limited’s Space Accelerator Programme
Agreement Paves way for joint Peptide Discovery and Optimisation Partnership
This is the fi rst strategic technology link Orbit has penned since its formation in 2016. The partnership underlines the commitment of the new management team to deliver ground-breaking technology and broader capabilities to the Partners engaged in applying the Company’s technology for the discovery of peptide therapeutic leads.
Peptide technology company Orbit Discovery has announced a partnership with WuXi AppTec that will see the combination of its peptide discovery platform and experience with the Chinese organisation’s downstream capabilities as a leading global provider of R&D and manufacturing services provision for the pharmaceutical and healthcare industry.
Specifi cally, Orbit gains access to WuXi AppTec’s expertise in peptide optimisation, peptide production and manufacturing to help its partners obtain clinically relevant data packs and materials in a rapid timeframe. Incorporating these capabilities into the Orbit platform will enable functional assays to be developed against a wider range of targets, facilitating direct functional screens using novel bead-based technologies and microfl uidics.
Dr Neil Butt, Chief Executive Offi cer of Orbit Discovery, commented: “We aim to move Orbit to the forefront of peptide discovery, and relationships such as this help us leverage expertise that would take far longer to grow organically. We see the partnership with WuXi AppTec as being a key relationship and a great asset to our current Partners, and Partners of the future.” He added: “We see particular value in the development and manufacturing platform of WuXi AppTec, that will enable us to generate peptides at small or large scale that incorporate chemical modifi cations to facilitate peptide optimisations and the journey towards a therapeutic candidate.”
“We are very pleased to have the opportunity to support Orbit Discovery and its research partners” commented Dr Dave Madge, VP Discovery Services at WuXi AppTec. “We see substantial synergies between the Orbit technology for peptide discovery and our platform for optimisation, characterisation and manufacture of novel peptide therapeutics.”
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Singapore-based space tech start-ups will have access to the UK space market, through STFC, including potential users in UK for testing of products and services
STFC will also facilitate access to UK test facilities and national laboratories
As STFC manages and co-funds the European Space Agency (ESA) Business Incubation Centre (BIC) UK with partners UK Space Agency and ESA Space Solutions, ESA BIC UK businesses will also benefi t from this new agreement and be supported to access investment and markets across Asia Pacifi c.
This agreement builds upon several years of science and innovation collaborations between STFC and Singaporean organisations, including the £10 million jointly funded Speqtre mission, scheduled for launch in 2024.
Led by STFC’s RAL Space in the UK and SpeQtral in Singapore, this research programme is building and deploying a satellite quantum key distribution test bed.
The collaboration aims to build on both countries’ efforts to grow the space and quantum technologies sectors by staking a claim in the emerging quantum key distribution market.
The agreement was signed at this year’s Global Space and Technology Convention (22 Feb) by STFC RAL Space’s Head of Business Development for Space, Robert Elliott; Singapore Space Technology Ltd CEO, Lynette Tan and witnessed by British High Commissioner to Singapore, Kara Owen.
STFC Executive Director for Business and Innovation, Paul Vernon, said: “Successful start-ups are an essential part of our future prosperity, and STFC has a clear commitment to provide the best environment possible for them to innovate and grow. Collaboration is a key factor when it comes to empowering businesses to overcome their challenges and succeed.
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Singapore and UK sign Start-ups to Space Tech Opportunities
Business
Opportunities Asia
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