American biotech company Novavax, together with Korea-based SK Group’s vaccine business subsidiary SK bioscience, has secured the South Korea’s Ministry of Food and Drug Safety (MFDS) approval for its recombinant, adjuvanted COVID-19 vaccine Nuvaxovid. The move strengthens Novavax’s presence in Asia through local partners, says GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.

According to GlobalData’s Pharma Intelligence Center, South Korea has fully vaccinated 84.6% of its population with more than 110 million vaccine doses administered as of 19 January 2022.

Indonesia was the first country globally to approve the Novavax COVID-19 vaccine, while India and the Philippines are the other two countries to approve it.  Novavax COVID-19 vaccine only received approval in major markets across the European Union, with pending approvals in the US and Japan.

Prashant Khadayate, Pharma Analyst at GlobalData, comments: “Novavax’s COVID-19 vaccine launch strategy could be termed as an outlier. Usually, pharma companies prioritize approvals in major markets. However, Novavax focused on approvals in Asian countries.

“Focus on Asian countries can also be attributed to a less fully vaccinated population than major markets. In addition, major markets are already dominated by vaccines from Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson.”

SK bioscience has already an agreement with the South Korean government to supply 40 million doses. Notably, Novavax has already procured supply orders of 120 million doses from South Korea, Indonesia and the Philippines.

Moreover, it is equally important to note that Novavax has partnered with leading local players. For example, Serum Institute of India for India, Indonesia and the Philippines, and SK bioscience for South Korea.

Khadayate concludes: “Novavax’s focus is on countries ignored by major COVID-19 manufacturers to gain a stronghold. Also, Novavax is partnering with strong local players, which can provide scale in terms of manufacturing and commercialization abilities to fulfill government orders from various countries.”