The actions of the Catalan laboratory Reig Jofre They star in the stock market session this Tuesday in Spain with a rise close to 30% after announcing an agreement with Janssen Pharmaceutical to produce its vaccine against the coronavirus on a large scale in Spain, which is still under investigation.
The titles of the company that emerged from the merger between the homonymous company and the Valencian Natraceutical, stood this morning at 4.91 euros, which brings the total capitalization of the company to 377 million euros.
The CEO of Reig Jofre, Ignasi Biosca, has explained to Efe that the Catalan firm will produce the vaccine from Spain, but not only for the Spanish market, but for “international markets”, although it has added that Janssen will mark when it should start the production, the volume and the countries to which it will be directed.
In a statement sent to the National Securities Market Commission (CNMV), Reig Jofre explains that the sterile injectable plant that will be in charge of production, located in Sant Joan Despà (Barcelona), will be finished in the first quarter of 2021, which will allow “a rapid and safe supply of the vaccine candidate” from Janssen, a pharmaceutical division of the American company Johnson & Johnson.
According to the terms of the agreement, the Catalan pharmaceutical company will be responsible for the formulation, filling and packaging of the Janssen vaccine candidate.
“Being chosen by Janssen as one of their partners for the production of their vaccine candidate will give Reig Jofre the opportunity to demonstrate the
strategic value of having a solid, competitive and technologically advanced industry in overcoming a critical situation such as the current one, “says Bosca in a statement to the supervisor of the markets in Spain.
In mid-November, Reig Jofre specified that it planned to start up its new sterile injectables plant in the first quarter of 2021, in which it has invested 30 million euros, and has already advanced that its technological and industrial capacity would potentially allow it to manufacture the Covid-19 vaccine. Biosca has said that the plant could produce “more than 250 million doses of the vaccine a year”, but that Janssen must decide what production capacity it requires.
He has also added that the production of the Janssen vaccine will require an additional investment -already started- in the Sant Joan Despà plant to guarantee compliance with the biosecurity levels and the requirements of the vaccine candidate for Janssen, but has not revealed the amount of the investment or the economic implications of this agreement for the Catalan pharmaceutical company.
When asked by Efe about when the production of the first batches of Janssen’s vaccine can be ready, the manager has avoided giving deadlines, and recalled that for the moment Reig Jofre is “approved” by Janssen to produce his vaccine, and which will be “ready” to produce when required from its Sant Joan Despà plant, which must complete the validation and tuning processes in the first quarter of the year.
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