In January last year, Novavax Inc. employees met. meet at a local Maryland bar to discuss how they could save their careers. For decades, the tiny biotech had tried to develop an approved vaccine, but without success. The company had enough money to survive only half a year, and the stock traded below $ 4, with a market value of $ 127 million.
Today Novavax is making progress towards approval of a Covid-19 vaccine. Scientists believe that, if approved, it could be one of the more powerful weapons against the pandemic and provide significant potential advantages over its competitors. Some early data suggests that the Novavax injection is one of the first to be shown to counteract the asymptomatic spread of the coronavirus and may also provide longer-term protection.
If the vaccine is approved, Novavax will still face the challenge of making and distributing it in bulk. The company sold a number of manufacturing assets in 2019 when it was desperate for cash.
Investors, who left the 33-year-old company for dead last year, are betting that regulators will approve Novavax’s vaccine in the coming months. They’ve sent shares on Nasdaq to $ 229, up 106% so far this year. Late last month, Novavax released preliminary data indicating that its shot was effective in protecting against Covid-19, but to a lesser extent against a new species identified in South Africa that also appears to challenge other injections. The results of the US late-stage trial of the vaccine could be released late next month.
Novavax now has a market value of $ 15.4 billion, more than that of companies with billions of dollars in annual sales, including the generic drug giant Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd.