Enesi Pharma, a pharmaceutical company developing injectable solid dose drug-device vaccine products, has secured funding from Innovate UK under the Biomedical Catalyst 2019 Round 1: Early and Late Stage Awards Initiative. The award of £870,419 will co-fund a new £1.24 million project to develop a scalable aseptic manufacturing process for live or live-attenuated viral vectors for use with Enesi’s ImplaVax needle-free solid dose technology.
 
“This substantial grant from Innovate UK will enable us to address a crucial challenge in the development of viral vector vaccines into a viable delivery format and to access the myriad benefits of our unique ImplaVax needle-free solid dose platform,” said David Hipkiss, chief executive officer, Enesi Pharma.
 
Enesi’s primary focus is the development of novel solid dose vaccines against a range of infectious and other select diseases, working in partnership with global companies, government agencies, leading academic institutions and non-governmental organizations.
 
Hipkiss continued, “Viral vector vaccines represent a rapidly growing area of interest as they form the foundation of multiple new candidates being developed by many companies to target defined and high-value opportunities in infectious diseases, emergent threat pathogens, allergies and oncology. We have already initiated exploratory studies on two of the most widely used viral vectors in development across the pharmaceutical industry—adenovirus and vaccinia virus—working in collaboration with leading international partners, including the University of Oxford, Sementis and Geovax.”