Hanmi Science said that it has entered a pandemic science alliance with the University of Oxford to conduct research to prevent new and mutated infectious diseases.
“The pandemic, along with the basic vaccine supply problems in many countries, has brought us together,” Hanmi Science CEO Lim Jong-yoon said. “The only way to resolve this issue is to work together, and we all have to take responsibility for the problems that exist.”
Among the three mRNA candidates that the Hanmi Science Consortium has already secured, the consortium aims to submit an investigational new drug (IND) application to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in the first half of next year through additional toxicity tests and process improvement studies, Lim added.
University of Oxford Vice-Chancellor Professor Louise Richardson also said, “Oxford and the Hanmi Science Consortium will be committed to accelerating vaccine research and development to reduce current and future global health inequalities and combat the contagious threat to human health.”
Richardson added that the University of Oxford’s Pandemic Sciences Centre would help achieve this goal by bringing the best scientists and research facilities together and investing in vaccine discovery, vaccine research, and process technology.
According to Hanmi Science, the University of Oxford operates the Oxford Vaccine Group (OVG) on campus, recognized as the best in clinical design and implementation for vaccine development.
Notably, Professor Andrew Pollard, who conducted the first clinical trial of the AstraZeneca vaccine, is the chairman of OVG. The company expects that he will play a significant role in this joint R&D cooperation.
CEO Lim emphasized that the previously approved vaccine products are produced by division of labor in several places for raw materials, undiluted solutions, and bottling.
“Since bio-production, especially the lipid structure including the genome, is a difficult material that cannot withstand this distribution process, it directly relates to side effects as well as economic loss,” Lim said. “Therefore, the development of next-generation vaccines must be achieved through continuous research alliances with universities in a single-roof facility.”
The Hanmi Science Consortium, which has a common goal of distributing vaccines worldwide, comprises Hanmi Pharmaceutical, Coree Company, GeneOne Life Science, Inovio Pharmaceuticals, BioApp Green Vaccine, Herings Digital Medical, Myongji Medical Foundation, GS Neotek, Pohang University of Science and Technology, and Pohang City.