Emergent BioSolutions scored more than $250 million in government contract modifications for four medical countermeasures, including anthrax, smallpox and botulism vaccines.
As part of the contract, Emergent will provide “millions” of treatment doses to the US government — good news for a company that underwent a restructuring and layoffs this year.
Emergent will get $30 million for the anthrax vaccine Cyfendus, which it’s also providing to the US military through a $235.8 million contract; $99.9 million for the smallpox vaccine ACAM2000; and $122.9 million to supply the national stockpile with treatments for botulism and smallpox vaccine complications.
The funding for the anthrax vaccine is part of Emergent’s decade-long contract with the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA). The company has several contracts with BARDA, including a $704 million agreement to scale up production of the Ebola treatment Ebanga. Moderna also announced a $176 million contract with BARDA to development an H5 avian flu strain vaccine.
The money behind Emergent’s updated contract comes from Project NextGen, which originally funded companies investigating treatments for Covid-19 and has now expanded to include other infectious diseases.
In a recent interview with Endpoints News, BARDA Director Gary Disbrow said that BARDA turned to Emergent during the pandemic because “they were the only group that had commercial-scale manufacturing capacity to manufacture both of those vaccines: the AstraZeneca and the Janssen.”
But Emergent has also had its share of problems, including a 2021 mix-up between Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca’s Covid vaccines in a Baltimore facility that led to millions of J&J’s doses being discarded. Then, in 2022, the FDA handed down a warning letter over hygiene and equipment maintenance, also at a facility in Baltimore.
Emergent began winding down two facilities and laid off 300 workers in May to save $80 million. Under new CEO Joe Papa, the company is undergoing a restructuring to focus on its Narcan and medical countermeasures business.