GlycoVaxyn announced the closing of a CHF 11.5 million (Euro 6.9 million) first round financing from Sofinnova Partners and Index Ventures, enabling it to continue the development of conjugated vaccines, consisting of antigenic glycoprotein complexes, which target bacterial infections. While such conjugated vaccines have been on the market for a number of years, for example a pneumococcal vaccine is now included in childhood immunisation programmes, current vaccines are difficult and costly to produce, as they have to go through many fermentation and processing steps.
GlycoVaxyn’s technology streamlines the production process by conducting the step of conjugating the sugar to the protein to form glycoproteins in E.Coli cells. The company says this will allow many new markets to be opened up, targeting some of the diseases most prevalent in developing countries.
GlycoVaxyn, is a spin-out of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH), is based in Schlieren, near Zurich.