South Korea-based SK bioscience has announced a future growth strategy to secure global top-tier vaccine development capabilities. The company plans to secure products and technology that will lead the endemic era by utilising the platform of SKYCovione, the first South Korean-developed COVID-19 vaccine. SKYCovione is based on recombinant protein vaccine technology which has been used for development of current vaccines including influenza, hepatitis B, and HPV. 

The supply of the flu vaccine ´SKYCellflu’ which was temporarily stopped for manufacturing SKYCovione to overcome the pandemic, will be normalised from next year. SkyCellflu, the world´s first cell-cultured quadrivalent influenza vaccine which has acquired the world first WHO (World Health Organization) PQ (Pre-qualification) certification as a cell-culture vaccine has the highest market share in Korea. It is expected to rapidly expand its domestic and overseas market share along with the resumption of supply.

‘SKYVaricella,’ the world second WHO PQ acquired varicella vaccine, is also planned to be supplied to the international procurement market. 

SK bioscience plans to extend a CDMO of the COVID-19 vaccine with Novavax and secure additional global CMO and CDMO partners. SK bioscience plans to further secure technologies in all areas of the cell and gene therapy (CGT) business to expand its business beyond vaccines to the bio sector. 

The Global Research and Process Development (R&PD) Center in Songdo will be established to operate as a base for the global network and to sequentially secure the infrastructure for all areas of biopharmaceuticals. L-HOUSE, SK’s vaccine manufacturing plant, located in Andong, South Korea also is also planned to be expanded its production capacity up to 5 times compared to the current through large-scale expansion and more world-class production facility certifications such as US cGMP.