REACH
AIM: FIPP
17
October 2024
Frontier IP Group
plc
("Frontier IP" or the
"Group")
Portfolio news - Innovate UK
awards Smart grant of more than £400,000 to The Vaccine Group and
the Animal and Plant Health Agency
Frontier IP, a specialist in
commercialising intellectual property, today notes the following
announcement from the University of Plymouth that portfolio company
The Vaccine Group ("TVG" or the "Company") and The Animal and Plant
Health Agency (APHA) have been awarded an Innovate UK Smart grant
of more than £400,000.
The grant money will be used to
develop vaccines for use in cattle based on TVG's novel
herpesvirus-based antigen delivery platform. Two diseases are
initially being targeted: bovine respiratory syncytial virus (BRSV)
and lumpy skin disease (LSD). BRSV is widespread globally and
causes severe economic harm, while LSD is spreading rapidly.
Frontier IP holds a 17 per cent stake in the Company.
APHA is an executive agency of the
Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra),
and also works on behalf of the Scottish and Welsh governments.
Itis responsible for animal, plant and bee health in the
UK.
The Innovate UK grant and APHA
collaboration is the latest in a series of awards and partnerships
announced by TVG this year. In September 2024, Defra awarded more
than £1 million to a project led by TVG, the University of Plymouth
and the University of Cambridge to develop vaccine candidates to
tackle Streptococcus suis, an emerging zoonotic disease prevalent
in pigs. Earlier this year the Company announced a collaboration
with The Pirbright Institute to develop vaccines to combat African
swine fever.
Frontier IP Chief Executive Officer Neil Crabb
said: "I am delighted with this latest grant award for TVG and the
collaboration with the Animal and Plant Health Agency. The number
of awards and the prestigious organisations the Company is working
with provides a strong validation of its novel technology. We are
very excited about its potential."
The
Vaccine Group statement begins:
IUK Smart grant awarded to
The Vaccine Group and APHA for cattle vaccine platform
development
The Animal and Plant Health Agency [APHA],
Surrey and The Vaccine Group Ltd., Plymouth, are delighted to
announce that Innovate UK has awarded them a Smart grant in excess
of £400,000. The grant will be used to further develop a novel
viral vector platform for the delivery of vaccine antigens for use
in cattle, in a project that will last for 19 months.
The technology that has been developed by
scientists at TVG's laboratories in Plymouth, Devon, has been used
to create candidate vaccines for several important infectious
diseases in cattle worldwide. In this project candidate vaccines
for two diseases will be used to demonstrate the capabilities of
the technology.
The two diseases for which candidate
vaccines have been created by TVG for this project are bovine
respiratory syncytial virus (BRSV) and lumpy skin disease (LSD).
BRSV is the leading viral cause of respiratory illness in
young calves in the UK, impacting around 1.9 million calves
annually and costing approximately £54 million. The virus is
prevalent worldwide and poses a substantial economic burden on both
beef and dairy producers. In the last 10 years, LSDV has spread
dramatically outside its natural enzootic geographies in Africa and
the Middle East, causing severe disease in first eastern Europe,
and then SE Asia and now the Far East.
Working with key opinion leaders for the
two diseases in the UK and Canada respectively, TVG has inserted
transgenes for protective antigens from each virus into two
separate constructs through genetic manipulation. Both vaccine
candidates have been shown to be stable genetically and have
demonstrated stable and prolonged protein expression in tissue
culture over multiple passages. Both diseases have broad global
prevalence, with BRSV especially affecting intensively reared
cattle globally. Currently available commercial vaccines for BRSV
do not prevent shedding and are restricted from use in very young
calves by maternal immunity. There are no DIVA vaccines
available for LSD currently, which limits their use in areas where
serosurveillance and eradication programmes are in place. TVG's
candidate vaccines will address all of these issues.
In addition to the scientific inputs from
TVG and APHA staff from the Department of Pathology and Animal
Sciences, the project will be supported by the World Reference
Laboratory for Non-Vesicular Diseases at The Pirbright Institute,
Surrey, to determine how the vaccine candidates can produce an
adequate serological response in animals and protect cattle from
these diseases.
Dr Jeremy
Salt, Chief Executive Officer at The Vaccine Group,
said: "For cattle farmers around the globe
infectious diseases are a major cause for concern and can lead to
significant losses - both in terms of animal health and welfare,
and in financial terms. Our goal in developing a viral vector
platform for use in cattle effective vaccines is to overcome some
of the deficiencies that affect the current commercialised
vaccines. By doing so, we can better protect the farmers, their
animals and their livelihoods. We can also make beef and milk
production more efficient, humane and sustainable, at the same time
helping the sector address the global challenges of antibiotic
resistance and carbon
emissions."
The project will build on previous research by
The Vaccine Group, through which the potential candidates for these
vaccines were identified.
The technology works by administering a benign
virus to cattle which in turn stimulates the expression of proteins
that induce an immune response in the animals to a
pathogen. The new trials will explore its potential to protect
against different infectious diseases of cattle.
The
Vaccine Group Statement ends
ENQUIRIES
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Frontier IP Group Plc
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T: 020 7332 2338
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Neil Crabb, Chief
Executive
Andrew Johnson, Communications and
investor relations
andrew.johnson@frontierip.co.uk
Company
website: www.frontierip.co.uk
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neil@frontierip.co.uk
M: 07464 546 025
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Allenby Capital Limited (Nominated
Adviser)
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T: 0203 328 5656
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Nick Athanas / George
Payne
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The
Vaccine Group
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Jeremy.salt@thevaccinegroup.co.uk
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Jeremy Salt, CEO
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ABOUT FRONTIER IP
Frontier IP unites science,
finance and industry by identifying strong intellectual property
and accelerating its development through a range of
commercialisation services. A critical part of the Group's work is
involving relevant industry partners at an early stage of
development to ensure technology meets real world demands and
needs.
The Group looks to build and grow a
portfolio of equity stakes and licence income by taking an active
involvement in spin-out companies, including support for fund
raising and collaboration with relevant industry partners at an
early stage of development.
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