Minapharm secures US$16.5M CEPI funding for Bundibugyo Ebola vaccine

EGYPT—Egyptian biopharmaceutical company Minapharm Group will receive up to US$16.5 million from the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) to advance development of a vaccine candidate against Bundibugyo ebolavirus.

The funding will support preclinical development and an early-stage human clinical trial to evaluate the candidate’s safety and ability to trigger an immune response. Minapharm expects to conduct the Phase 1 trial in Africa.

ProBioGen, a Berlin-based biotechnology company and wholly owned subsidiary of Minapharm, designed the vaccine candidate using its proprietary modified vaccinia Ankara (MVA) platform, MVA-CR19.

The platform has also supported technologies used in licensed vaccines against smallpox and mpox and has demonstrated the ability to generate long-lasting immunity against the related Zaire ebolavirus.

Minapharm’s candidate is the fifth Bundibugyo-specific vaccine supported by CEPI as the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) responds to a rapidly escalating outbreak.

Focus on African vaccine innovation

CEPI said the candidate will complement its portfolio of vaccines based on different technologies, increasing the prospects of developing safe and effective vaccines against Bundibugyo ebolavirus.

According to CEPI, Minapharm’s candidate is the only Bundibugyo vaccine in its portfolio designed to stimulate both B-cell and T-cell immune responses, which could provide broad and durable protection.

“CEPI’s funding to Minapharm harnesses the growing strength of African-led innovation to help confront this increasingly severe outbreak and prepare for future threats,” said Dr Richard Hatchett, CEO of CEPI.

He added that the rapid spread of Bundibugyo virus in the DRC highlights the urgent need to accelerate vaccine development.

Dr Wafik Bardissi, Group Chairman and CEO of Minapharm and Chairman of ProBioGen, said the company has spent more than 25 years building biologics development and manufacturing capabilities in Egypt.

“With CEPI’s support, we are turning scientific ingenuity into health sovereignty, drawing on the breadth of our technologies and know-how to advance a vaccine response for Africa,” he said.

Manufacturing plans

Under the programme, ProBioGen will manufacture the recombinant MVA drug substance under Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) standards.

The drug substance, which contains the active vaccine component, will initially be shipped to Minapharm’s facility in Cairo for formulation into the finished vaccine.

Minapharm also plans to transfer drug-substance manufacturing to its biotechnology facilities in Cairo, creating the capacity for local production of both the drug substance and finished vaccine.

Dr Volker Sandig, Chief Scientific Officer of ProBioGen, said the MVA-CR19 platform was developed to enable rapid production of recombinant MVA vaccine candidates and scalable manufacturing.

Path to clinical development

If the Phase 1 trial produces positive results, CEPI expects to work with Minapharm and ProBioGen on later-stage trials to generate efficacy data required for emergency use authorisation and licensure.

CEPI aims to advance at least two Bundibugyo vaccine candidates toward Emergency Use Authorisation and World Health Organization prequalification.

The programme is funded by the European Commission through CEPI’s 2026 Horizon Europe grant, the U.S. Department of State, and CEPI’s existing core funding.

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