CureVac has signed several agreements with Sanofi Pasteur, the vaccines division of Sanofi. Under these agreements, CureVac and Sanofi Pasteur will further develop and apply CureVac’s proprietary RNActive technology platform to the development of vaccines against several infectious diseases.

A research proposal with total funding of $33.1 million involving a collaboration among CureVac, Sanofi Pasteur (including Sanofi Pasteur VaxDesign) and In-Cell-Art, a French biotech company, has been selected by DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (an agency of the United States Department of Defense). In this 4-year project, CureVac and the other parties to the collaboration will further advance key aspects of CureVac’s RNActive technology platform and will evaluate several vaccine candidates in a number of relevant disease models

CureVac and Sanofi Pasteur have also signed an option agreement with pre-agreed license terms for several pre-defined pathogens. Sanofi Pasteur’s option rights are linked to fulfillment of certain agreed acceptance criteria relating to the DARPA project. CureVac retains the rights to its own core development programs and to all of its background technology for any other pathogens outside those within the Sanofi Pasteur option.

Under the terms of the license agreements, CureVac may receive an upfront payment from Sanofi Pasteur for each pathogen, research funding and payments for achieving several clinical, regulatory and commercial milestones. For each pathogen subject to Sanofi Pasteur’s option, the agreements could encompass up to €101.5 million for CureVac in upfront and milestone payments in addition to tiered royalties on sales of RNActive vaccines if Sanofi Pasteur develops a prophylactic or a therapeutic vaccine against such pathogen and up to €150.5 million if Sanofi-Pasteur develops both a prophylactic and a therapeutic vaccine. Under the license agreements, Sanofi Pasteur will fund all research and development activities and will have exclusive marketing rights worldwide for RNActive vaccines against the pathogens for which Sanofi Pasteur has exercised the option.