Moderna’s mRNA facility in Africa to manufacture 500 million vaccine doses

Moderna has announced that it will build a state-of-the-art messenger RNA (mRNA) facility in Africa with the goal of producing up to 500 million doses of vaccines each year at the 50µg dose level. The company anticipates investing up to $500 million in this new facility, which is expected to include drug substance manufacturing with the opportunity for fill/finish and packaging capabilities at the site. Moderna expects to begin a process for country and site selection soon.

“Since Moderna’s founding in 2010, our mission has been to make a transformative impact on human lives through our medicines. After a decade of pioneering the development of our mRNA platform, we have been humbled to play a critical role in combatting the COVID-19 pandemic globally with our mRNA vaccine. We view Moderna’s work as only just beginning,” stated Stéphane Bancel, Chief Executive Officer at Moderna. “On behalf of our growing team, partners and share holders, we are determined to extend Moderna’s societal impact through the investment in a state-of-the-art mRNA manufacturing facility in Africa.

“While we are still working to increase capacity in our current network to deliver vaccines for the ongoing pandemic in 2022, we believe it is important to invest in the future. We expect to manufacture our COVID-19 vaccine as well as additional products within our mRNA vaccine portfolio at this facility.”

Moderna emphasised that the company and its partners have ramped up capacity worldwide and have supplied more than 500 million doses of Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine (Spikevax) to date and there are several efforts to continue increasing capacity at a significant pace. This announcement is a new investment aimed at adding a manufacturing site in Africa to the company’s expanding global network.

Moderna’s pipeline includes 20 vaccine candidates in its prophylactic vaccines modality, including vaccines against respiratory viruses, latent viruses and threats to global public health.