Inventprise will carry out fill-finish for its pneumococcal disease vaccine, IVT-PCV-25 at its newly opened facility in Woodinville.

Inventprise, a firm that specializes in affordable vaccines and is supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF), has announced the inauguration of its manufacturing facility intended for high-capacity supply of a 25-valent Pneumococcal Conjugate Vaccine (IVT-PCV-25) for distribution to low-and-middle-income countries.

IVT-PCV-25 is being developed by Inventprise in partnership with non-profit global health organization PATH. According to the firm, the vaccine uses a platform to protect individuals against different strains of the pneumococcal disease, which kills around 300,000 children globally before the age of five each year.

Bill Gates at Inventprise’s facility. Image c/o Gates Ventures

A spokesperson for Inventprise told BioProcess Insider that executive chairman at the company, Subhash Kapre “has combined his forty years of experience in manufacturing low-cost affordable vaccines [at the Serum Institute of India], designed for UNICEF and other global procurement organizations, with state-of-the-art automation and efficient design,” has made it possible to make the vaccine affordable.

Tens of millions of doses

The firm expects to produce tens of millions of doses of the investigational vaccine over the coming years in preparation for competition of later stage clinical trials and application for World Health Organization (WHO) prequalification.

Additionally, Inventprise said it will also have the capability to meet additional demand for the vaccine outside of low-and-middle-income countries. And after initiating clinical trials, the spokesperson said it would contemplate “expansion of manufacturing sites if demand for IVT-PCV-25 is robust and other pipeline programs are successful.”

The facility itself is also said to have been “built at significantly lower costs than comparable US manufacturing sites,” because of its careful design and procurement. However, exact financials were not disclosed but to date BMGF has funded over $190 million to support Inventprise, its programs, and its manufacturing facilities.