EuroBusiness Media (EBM): I have the pleasure of meeting with the President and CEO of Valneva. Thomas Lingelbach welcome.
Thomas Lingelbach: Pleasure
EBM: Could you tell us a little bit about Valneva?
Thomas Lingelbach: Valneva is a biotech company focusing on developing, manufacturing, commercializing vaccines against infectious diseases in areas of high unmet medical need.
We have two vaccines for travelers in the marketplace and those help us to fund our exciting R&D pipeline that includes the most advanced vaccine against Lyme disease worldwide as well as vaccines against Chikungunya and Zika.
EBM: What are your main sources of revenue and how do you see them evolving?
Thomas Lingelbach: We have two travelers vaccines. One called IXIARO®, a vaccine against Japanese encephalitis. The other one called DUKORAL®, a vaccine against cholera and, in some markets also ETEC. Those two products have nicely grown in the market so far and we expect continuous growth in the years to come.
They represent the vast majority of our revenues and going forward we expect by a combination of organic growth complemented with strategic growth we may go from about €100 million in revenues today to about €200 million in revenues.
EBM: With regard to your clinical vaccine portfolio, you have some very promising candidates, and you notably mentioned the most advanced Lyme disease vaccine on the market today. Could you expand on that please?
Thomas Lingelbach: We are very proud that we have the most advanced and actually the only clinical-stage vaccine program against Lyme diseases worldwide. It is a vaccine designed to prevent Lyme disease, the most common vector-borne illness in the northern hemisphere today for people living on both sides of the Atlantic. It includes the six most common species of Borrelia spirochaetes that are prevalent in Europe and North America.
This program got Fast Track Designation by the FDA. With the FDA and EMA we work to accelerate the time to market for this desperately needed vaccine in an area of very high unmet medical need.
In addition, we are developing vaccines against the Chikungunya and Zika viruses. Both are mosquito-transmitted diseases for which, currently, no prevention or treatment exist.
Here we are leveraging the expertise that we have gained through our development of the Japanese encephalitis vaccine, which we developed all the way from bench to market.
EBM: And looking to the future, how do you see the Company evolving?
Thomas Lingelbach: Valneva is already a leading vaccine biotech company today. But we would like to become the leading vaccine biotech company by a combination of organic and strategic growth, by developing novel vaccines in the areas of high unmet medical need and ultimately we would like to contribute to a world in which no one dies or suffers from a vaccine-preventable disease.
EBM: Thomas Lingelbach, President and CEO of Valneva thank you.
Thomas Lingelbach: Thank you.
