Chinese Vaccine Maker Raises $240 Million in Hong Kong Debut

China’s Clover Biopharmaceuticals has raised a net HK$1.87 billion ($240 million) in its initial public offering on the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong. The company is hoping to get its COVID-19 protein subunit vaccine, SCB-2019, approved by the end of the year.

Clover’s Friday IPO was priced at HK$13.38, close to the upper range between HK$12.50 and HK$13.50. This gives the company an initial market capitalization of nearly $2 billion.

Over half of the shares in the public float have been pre-booked by nine cornerstone investors, including Temasek, Singapore’s wealth fund, and China’s Hillhouse Capital.

Clover shares were down 3% on the first day of trading, dropping from HK$13.38 to HK$12.98. The stock slid further to HK$10.30 by noon today.

Founded in 2007, Clover has yet to get approval for any of its products. The company posted a loss of $912.9 million yuan ($142.7 million) in 2020 due to drug development costs.

Clover intends to reverse its losses, with plans to apply for emergency use approval of its vaccine in China, the EU, and WHO in the fourth quarter of 2021.

The company has already signed a deal to supply up to 414 million COVID-19 vaccine doses to Gavi, the global vaccine alliance. Gavi will distribute the doses to developing countries via Covax, the global vaccine sharing scheme. As per the deal, Gavi has prepaid $160 million to Clover.

Using Proceeds to Advance Pipeline

According to its prospectus, Clover intends to use approximately a third of the IPO proceeds on preparing its COVID-19 subunit vaccine SCB-2019 for regulatory approval, launch, and sales, as well as post-marketing studies.

The company will use a quarter of the capital to develop second-generation COVID-19 vaccine candidates. A similar amount is being set aside to develop other candidates in its pipeline.

Clover’s pipeline includes six subunit vaccines and three protein-based cancer drugs, developed with the company’s Trimer-Tag platform, which fuses proteins in groups of three. Clover is also developing three Fc-fusion proteins (bioengineered polypeptides). In total, its candidates cover 13 indications. 

While SCB-2019 is its most advanced vaccine program, covering the original COVID strain, another candidate, SCB-20205 targeting the Beta strain, is in the preclinical phase. Other vaccine programs cover rabies, influenza, RSV, and HIV.

Clover’s most advanced oncology program investigates SCB-313 for malignant ascites. The condition is seen in end-stage cancer, where cancer has spread to the linings of the organs within the abdomen. The company is planning a Phase 2 trial for the drug in the first quarter of 2022.

Clover’s SCB-808 is an Fc-fusion protein and a biosimilar to Amgen’s Enbrel (etanercept). It is undergoing a Phase 3 trial for a form of arthritis called ankylosing spondylitis.

Clover’s COVID-19 Vaccine

Clover’s COVID-19 vaccine uses a trimeric spike protein that resembles the original spike on the coronavirus. 

The company has also partnered with Dynavax to use the latter’s adjuvant in the vaccine to boost the immune response.

In September, Clover announced that its vaccine showed an overall efficacy rate of 67.2% against COVID-19 in a global trial involving 30,000 adults. In particular, the shot displayed 78.7% efficacy against the Delta variant.

Being protein-based, the vaccine can be easily scaled up for mass production. Unlike mRNA vaccines which need to be stored at ultra-cold temperatures, Clover’s vaccine can be stored for long periods of time at 2-8 degrees Celsius. Even at room temperature, the shot could remain stable for at least two months.

Author

Joy Lin

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