Baker McKenzie advises CureVac on strategic partnership with GSK

Munich — Baker McKen­zie advi­sed Cure­Vac AG on a stra­te­gic colla­bo­ra­tion agree­ment with Glax­oS­mit­h­Kline (GSK) to rese­arch, deve­lop, gene­rate and commer­cia­lize up to five mRNA-based vacci­nes and mono­clonal anti­bo­dies (mAbs) to combat infec­tious dise­ase patho­gens. The colla­bo­ra­tion comple­ments GSK’s exis­ting mRNA exper­tise with CureVac’s inte­gra­ted mRNA platform.

Further deve­lo­p­ment of mRNA-based vacci­nes and thera­pies could play a criti­cal role in miti­ga­ting future pande­mics. The two compa­nies are combi­ning their mRNA exper­tise to combat a wide range of infec­tious dise­ase patho­gens. These projects were speci­fi­cally selec­ted to take full advan­tage of this plat­form tech­no­logy, while also addres­sing unmet medi­cal needs and asso­cia­ted econo­mic burdens.

Cure­Vac is entit­led to payments for deve­lo­p­ment and regu­la­tory mile­sto­nes of up to EUR 320 million and for commer­cial mile­sto­nes of up to EUR 380 million. — In addi­tion, Cure­Vac recei­ves tiered royal­ties on product sales. In addi­tion, GSK will make a one-time payment of EUR 120 million and a refundable payment of EUR 30 million. The latter will be due as soon as CureVac’s indus­trial produc­tion faci­lity curr­ently under cons­truc­tion in Germany has recei­ved its GMP (Good Manu­fac­tu­ring Prac­tice) certi­fi­ca­tion from the rele­vant autho­ri­ties. Under the terms of the agree­ment, GSK will also make an equity invest­ment of EUR 150 million in Cure­Vac, repre­sen­ting just under 10% of CureVac’s share capital.

“We are very plea­sed to support Cure­Vac in this important colla­bo­ra­tion agree­ment with GSK, which brings toge­ther two world-class compa­nies to further deve­lop their mRNA-based vacci­nes and thera­pies to combat a wide range of infec­tious dise­ase agents,” commen­ted Dr. Constanze Ulmer-Eilfort (pictu­red), lead part­ner at Baker McKen­zie on the transaction.

Cure­Vac is a long-stan­­ding client of Baker McKen­zie. Under the leader­ship of Dr. Constanze Ulmer-Eilfort, Baker McKen­zie advi­sed Cure­Vac on, among other things, the colla­bo­ra­tion agree­ments with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foun­da­tion and CEPI, and most recently on the stra­te­gic part­ner­ship with Genmab A/S for the deve­lo­p­ment of mRNA-based anti­body thera­pies (Decem­ber 2019).

Legal advi­sor Cure­Vac AG: Baker McKenzie
Lead: IP: Dr. Constanze Ulmer-Eilfort, LL.M. (Part­ner, Munich)
IP: Julia Schie­ber (Senior Asso­ciate, Zurich), Andreas Jauch (Senior Asso­ciate, Frankfurt),
Anti­trust: Dr. Chris­tian Burholt (Part­ner, Berlin)
Pharma: Dr. Thilo Räpple (Part­ner, Frankfurt)