Vaccitech plc is a

biotechnology Biotechnology is the integration of natural sciences and engineering sciences in order to achieve the application of organisms, cells, parts thereof and molecular analogues for products and services. The term ''biotechnology'' was first used b ...

company developing vaccines and immunotherapies for infectious diseases and cancer, such as

hepatitis B Hepatitis B is an infectious disease caused by the ''Hepatitis B virus'' (HBV) that affects the liver; it is a type of viral hepatitis. It can cause both acute and chronic infection. Many people have no symptoms during an initial infection. Fo ...

HPV Human papillomavirus infection (HPV infection) is caused by a DNA virus from the '' Papillomaviridae'' family. Many HPV infections cause no symptoms and 90% resolve spontaneously within two years. In some cases, an HPV infection persists and re ...

and

prostate cancer Prostate cancer is cancer of the prostate. Prostate cancer is the second most common cancerous tumor worldwide and is the fifth leading cause of cancer-related mortality among men. The prostate is a gland in the male reproductive system that sur ...

Technology

The company's platform includes

Chimpanzee The chimpanzee (''Pan troglodytes''), also known as simply the chimp, is a species of great ape native to the forest and savannah of tropical Africa. It has four confirmed subspecies and a fifth proposed subspecies. When its close relative th ...

Adenovirus Adenoviruses (members of the family ''Adenoviridae'') are medium-sized (90–100 nm), nonenveloped (without an outer lipid bilayer) viruses with an icosahedral nucleocapsid containing a double-stranded DNA genome. Their name derives from the ...

Oxford ( ChAdOx) and

Modified Vaccinia Ankara Modified vaccinia Ankara (MVA) is an attenuated (weakened) strain of the vaccinia virus. It is being used as a vaccine (called MVA-BN, brand names: Imvanex in the EU, Imvamune in Canada, and Jynneos in the US) against smallpox and monkeypox, havi ...

(MVA), two

viral vector Viral vectors are tools commonly used by molecular biologists to deliver genetic material into cells. This process can be performed inside a living organism (''in vivo'') or in cell culture (''in vitro''). Viruses have evolved specialized molecul ...

s which safely mimic

viral infection A viral disease (or viral infection) occurs when an organism's body is invaded by pathogenic viruses, and infectious virus particles (virions) attach to and enter susceptible cells. Structural Characteristics Basic structural characteristics, s ...

in human cells and elicit

antibody An antibody (Ab), also known as an immunoglobulin (Ig), is a large, Y-shaped protein used by the immune system to identify and neutralize foreign objects such as pathogenic bacteria and viruses. The antibody recognizes a unique molecule of the ...

and

T cell A T cell is a type of lymphocyte. T cells are one of the important white blood cells of the immune system and play a central role in the adaptive immune response. T cells can be distinguished from other lymphocytes by the presence of a T-cell r ...

responses to

pathogen In biology, a pathogen ( el, πάθος, "suffering", "passion" and , "producer of") in the oldest and broadest sense, is any organism or agent that can produce disease. A pathogen may also be referred to as an infectious agent, or simply a germ ...

s and

tumour A neoplasm () is a type of abnormal and excessive growth of tissue. The process that occurs to form or produce a neoplasm is called neoplasia. The growth of a neoplasm is uncoordinated with that of the normal surrounding tissue, and persists ...

History

The company was founded in 2016 as a

University spin-off University spin-offs (also known as university spin-outs) are companies that transform technological inventions developed from university research that are likely to remain unexploited otherwise. They are a subcategory of research spin-offs. Promi ...

Sarah Gilbert Dame Sarah Catherine Gilbert (born April 1962) is an English vaccinologist who is a Professor of Vaccinology at the University of Oxford and co-founder of Vaccitech. She specialises in the development of vaccines against influenza and emergi ...

and

Adrian V. S. Hill Adrian Vivian Sinton Hill, (born 9 October 1958) is an Irish vaccinologist, Director of the Jenner Institute and Lakshmi Mittal and Family Professor of Vaccinology at the University of Oxford, an honorary Consultant Physician in Infectious Dis ...

at The

Jenner Institute The Jenner Institute is a research institute on the Old Road Campus in Headington, east Oxford, England. It was formed in November 2005 through a partnership between the University of Oxford and the UK Institute for Animal Health. It is ass ...

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

. Vaccitech has been financed and supported by M&G Catalyst,

Google Ventures GV is a venture capital investment arm of Alphabet Inc., founded by Bill Maris, that provides Seed investment, seed, Venture capital financing, venture, and Growth investing, growth stage funding to technology companies. Founded as Google Venture ...

(GV),

Fosun International Fosun International Limited is a Chinese multinational conglomerate holding company. Founded in 1992 by Guo Guangchang and four others, the company is headquartered in Shanghai and was incorporated in Hong Kong in 2004. Its Co-CEOs are Chen Q ...

Tencent Tencent Holdings Ltd. () is a Chinese multinational technology and entertainment conglomerate and holding company headquartered in Shenzhen. It is one of the highest grossing multimedia companies in the world based on revenue. It is also the w ...

Huawei Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. ( ; ) is a Chinese multinational technology corporation headquartered in Shenzhen, Guangdong, China. It designs, develops, produces and sells telecommunications equipment, consumer electronics and various smar ...

Sequoia Capital Sequoia Capital is an American venture capital firm. The firm is headquartered in Menlo Park, California, and specializes in seed stage, early stage, and growth stage investments in private companies across technology sectors. , Sequoia's total a ...

, GeneMatrix, Liontrust Asset Management, Korea Investment Partners and

Oxford Sciences Innovation Oxford Sciences Enterprises is an early-stage venture capital firm with over $800M in AUM based in Oxford, UK. It operates in partnership with the University of Oxford, as the university's preferred investor, several prominent financiers back th ...

(OSI). In early 2020, Vaccitech and the

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

co-invented a vaccine for COVID-19 using the ChAdOx platform.

COVID-19 vaccine

In July 2020, it was reported that people in Brazil, South Africa and the US had been recruited to populate the vaccine trials. In July 2020, Vaccitech scientists reported in ''

The Lancet ''The Lancet'' is a weekly peer-reviewed general medical journal and one of the oldest of its kind. It is also the world's highest-impact academic journal. It was founded in England in 1823. The journal publishes original research articles, ...

'' a "single-blind, randomised controlled trial in five trial sites in the UK of a

chimpanzee The chimpanzee (''Pan troglodytes''), also known as simply the chimp, is a species of great ape native to the forest and savannah of tropical Africa. It has four confirmed subspecies and a fifth proposed subspecies. When its close relative th ...

adenovirus Adenoviruses (members of the family ''Adenoviridae'') are medium-sized (90–100 nm), nonenveloped (without an outer lipid bilayer) viruses with an icosahedral nucleocapsid containing a double-stranded DNA genome. Their name derives from the ...

-vectored vaccine (

ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 ChAdOx1 is an adenoviral vector for vaccines that was developed by the Jenner Institute, University of Oxford. The vector is a chimpanzee adenovirus modified to avoid its replication. Adenoviruses are effective vectors for inducing and boosting ...

) expressing the

SARS-CoV-2 Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS‑CoV‑2) is a strain of coronavirus that causes COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019), the respiratory illness responsible for the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The virus previously had a ...

spike protein." Several subjects needed

prophylactic Preventive healthcare, or prophylaxis, consists of measures taken for the purposes of disease prevention.Hugh R. Leavell and E. Gurney Clark as "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life, and promoting physical and mental hea ...

paracetamol Paracetamol, also known as acetaminophen, is a medication used to treat fever and mild to moderate pain. Common brand names include Tylenol and Panadol. At a standard dose, paracetamol only slightly decreases body temperature; it is inferior ...

to minimize their adverse reactions.

Listing on NASDAQ

Vaccitech held an initial public offering of shares in 2021, listing on NASDAQ on 30 April 2021 under the symbol VACC.

References

{{reflist British companies established in 2016 Companies based in Oxford Biotechnology companies of the United Kingdom Biotechnology companies established in 2016 Vaccine producers COVID-19 vaccine producers Medical research Companies listed on the Nasdaq