Open Orphan secures major contract with mystery vaccine developer

Pharmaceutical services company Open Orphan has signed a major contract with an unnamed vaccine developer.

Open Orphan said on Thursday that the contract, inked via its subsidiary Venn Life Sciences, built upon earlier successful contracts between the two companies and was designed to obtain and support market access of newly developed vaccines into the EU and US markets until the end of 2020.

The AIM-listed group said the deal fit with its strategic aim of becoming a leading pharma services provider to the "rapidly growing" vaccines industry.

Chairman Cathal Friel said: "This contract reinforces Open Orphan's position as one of the leading service providers to the vaccine industry globally.

"As a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, the vaccine industry is now an increasingly important and rapidly growing sector with many large pharmaceutical companies now directing huge amounts of resources towards their vaccine divisions to progress both Covid-19 and non-Covid-19 vaccines. Open Orphan is ideally positioned to capitalise upon this trend as we build the company into a growing, profitable pharmaceutical services business."

As of 1025 BST, Open Orphan shares were up 2.15% at 11.85p.