GC halts discussing contract manufacturing of Janssen's Covid-19 vaccine

GC announced on Thursday that it stopped the discussion on the contract manufacturing organization (CMO) agreement on Janssen's Covid-19 vaccine.

GC announced that it would not manufacture Janssen’s Covid-19 vaccine.

In August, some media outlets reported that GC discussed a CMO agreement with Janssen for the latter's Covid-19 vaccine. However, the company has since said that nothing was confirmed. In the following two months, the company also stressed that there was no specific decision.

GC’s announcement on the cessation of discussions with Janssen on CMO for its vaccines means the company officially acknowledged the project’s end, industry watchers said.

GC was unavailable for comments regarding the situation.

Janssen Covid-19 vaccine is a virus vector vaccine that received product approval from the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety on April 7. The vaccine synthesizes antigen protein by recombining the coronavirus surface antigen gene and inserting it into human adenovirus before injecting it into the body.

The protein induces the production of neutralizing antibodies, which has the effect of neutralizing and removing the Covid-19 virus when it enters the human body. Although it has the advantage of requiring only one injection, many countries are administering booster shots to Janssen vaccine recipients as the efficacy is low compared to other Coivd-19 vaccines.