EU Provides BioNTech $113 Million to Develop COVID-19 Vaccine

The European Investment Bank is making available up to $113 million in financing for BioNTech’s BNT162, a messenger RNA-based vaccine, and the scaling up of manufacturing capacity for it in Europe.

Germany-based BioNTech is developing multiple mRNA vaccine candidates in collaboration with Pfizer. The companies began testing in Germany in April, and in the U.S. in May (DID, May 6).

Pfizer said it plans to manufacture millions of doses of BNT162 by the end of the year and hundreds of millions of doses next year.

BioNTech is in a separate collaboration with Fosun Pharma to commercialize the vaccine in China (DID, April 30). — Jordan Williams