Moderna, Inc., a biotechnology company pioneering messenger RNA (mRNA) therapeutics and vaccines, announced that the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare of Japan (MHLW) and Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited have agreed to purchase and distribute an additional 50 million doses of Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine and its updated variant booster vaccine candidate, if authorized, to begin delivery in 2022.
This new supply agreement is in addition to the prior agreement for 50 million doses in 2021 resulting in a total of 100 million doses for Japan. Moderna is responsible for the manufacture and supply of Moderna’s vaccine candidate, and Takeda, with the support of the MHLW and Moderna, is responsible for all import, local regulatory, development and distribution activities in Japan for these additional 50 million doses beginning in 2022.
“We thank the MHLW and Takeda for their support and for partnering with us to bring our mRNA COVID-19 vaccine to Japan,” said Stéphane Bancel, Moderna’s Chief Executive Officer. “We remain committed to making our vaccine available around the world as we seek to address the pandemic.”
About Moderna
In 10 years since its inception, Moderna has transformed from a science research-stage company advancing programs in the field of messenger RNA (mRNA), to an enterprise with a diverse clinical portfolio of vaccines and therapeutics across six modalities, a broad intellectual property portfolio in areas including mRNA and lipid nanoparticle formulation, and an integrated manufacturing plant that allows for both clinical and commercial production at scale and at unprecedented speed. Moderna maintains alliances with a broad range of domestic and overseas government and commercial collaborators, which has allowed for the pursuit of both groundbreaking science and rapid scaling of manufacturing. Most recently, Moderna’s capabilities have come together to allow the authorized use of one of the earliest and most-effective vaccines against the COVID-19 pandemic.
Moderna’s mRNA platform builds on continuous advances in basic and applied mRNA science, delivery technology and manufacturing, and has allowed the development of therapeutics and vaccines for infectious diseases, immuno-oncology, rare diseases, cardiovascular diseases and auto-immune diseases. Today, 24 development programs are underway across these therapeutic areas, with 15 programs having entered the clinic. Moderna has been named a top biopharmaceutical employer by Science for the past six years. To learn more, visit www.modernatx.com.
