Description
CureVac is a biopharmaceutical company headquartered in Tübingen, Germany, that develops therapies based on messenger RNA (mRNA). The company's focus is on developing vaccines for infectious diseases and drugs to treat for cancer and rare diseases. Founded in 2000 by Ingmar Hoerr (CEO), Steve Pascolo (CSO), Florian von der Mulbe (COO), Gunther Jung and Hans-Georg Rammensee, CureVac had approximately 240 employees in November 2015 and 375 in May 2018.
CureVac has entered into various collaborations with organizations, including agreements with Boehringer Ingelheim, Sanofi Pasteur, Johnson & Johnson, Genmab, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Eli Lilly and Company, GlaxoSmithKline, Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, and the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative.
History
In October 2013 CureVac launched a collaboration with Janssen Pharmaceuticals Inc., a Johnson & Johnson company, for the development of novel flu vaccines. Also in 2013, CureVac announced the fourth in a series of partnerships with the Cancer Research Institute and Ludwig Cancer Research to enable clinical testing of novel cancer immunotherapy treatment options.
In March 2014, CureVac won a €2 million prize awarded by the European Commission to stimulate new vaccine technologies. Later, in July 2014, CureVac signed an exclusive license agreement with Sanofi Pasteur to develop and commercialize an mRNA-based prophylactic vaccine. By September 2014, the company licensed the global rights for its Phase I candidate – CV9202 – to Boehringer Ingelheim. Boehringer was to conduct trials using the mRNA vaccine in combination with afatinib in advanced and/or metastatic epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) mutated non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) as well as inoperable stage III NSCLC.
In March 2015, a CureVac investor, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, agreed to provide separate funding for several projects to develop prophylactic vaccines based on CureVac's proprietary mRNA platform. By September 2015, CureVac entered into a collaboration with the International AIDS Vaccine Initiative (IAVI) to accelerate the development of AIDS vaccines, utilizing immunogens developed by IAVI and partners, delivered via CureVac's mRNA technology. That same month, CureVac announced it would open a United States hub in Boston, Massachusetts.
In accordance with its deal with Lilly, the company began construction on a production facility in 2016.
