Enhances Q-VANT’s 100% sustainable supply for next-generation saponin adjuvants

Boston, MA – March 8, 2022 – Q-VANT Biosciences, the first company to achieve a 100% sustainable way to meet the growing global vaccine market demand for Quillaja saponin-based adjuvants, today announced that it has signed an agreement with In vitro Plant-tech AB, a Swedish plant cell cultivation company whose technology platform and manufacturing facilities will permit the sustainable production of Quillaja saponaria biomass within bioreactors. This collaboration will create an additional source of raw materials that will enhance the sourcing matrix of Q-VANT, adding the key benefit of flexibility of being able to produce it anywhere in the world. This is in line with the company’s strategy of guaranteeing the long-term sustainability and continuity of supply for saponin-based adjuvants including QS-21 for the pharmaceutical markets.

QS-21 is considered the “Gold Standard” adjuvant for enhancing immune response to vaccine antigens and is a vital component in more than 17 human vaccine candidates, including the FDA-approved GSK Shingrix® shingles vaccine and the WHO-authorized, GSK Mosquirix® malaria vaccine. In addition, saponin-based adjuvants are a key component in the Novavax COVID-19 vaccine, which has been shown to be highly effective in clinical trials and has recently been authorized for emergency use by the European Union (EU) and the World Health Organization (WHO).

QS-21 is traditionally extracted from the bark of mature trees native to Chile known as the Quillaja saponaria — a harvesting process that negatively impacts the forest and the sustainability of the resource.  Today, with regulatory restrictions on deforestation of this tree, and projected demand for QS-21 in the billions of doses annually, shortages of QS-21 are affecting the pharmaceutical market’s ability to meet the surging need for vaccine dosages globally.

Q-VANT’s Q-SAP™ (Quillaja Sustainable Adjuvant Platform) is a technology platform combining computational learning techniques and a proprietary multi-step purification process to systematically enhance Quillaja sourcing options and to drive extremely effective outputs. The first of its kind, Q-SAP enables Q-VANT to obtain adjuvant products from a wide range of Quillaja-based plant materials, which can increase production volumes by as much as 1,000 times, leading to billions of doses in a 100% sustainable way.

“In vitro Plant-tech’s plant cell technology experts have over 25 years of experience,” said Doug Klaiber, the CEO of Q-VANT. “Their expertise coupled with their cell culture platform and production capabilities will enhance our supply and is complementary to our mission to meet the growing demand and secure supply chain continuity for delivering the world with billions of doses of 100% sustainable QS-21 and other saponin-based adjuvants.”

“In vitro Plant-tech is delighted to offer our plant cell cultivation technology, cell cultivation and enhancement platforms, and production capabilities to support Q-VANT on their mission to meet the growing demand for QS-21 and other saponin-based adjuvants,” said Anna Holefors, founder and CEO of In Vitro Plant-tech. “We look forward to paving the path for a fully sustainable QS-21 production platform and helping in the development and production of life saving vaccines.”

About Q-Vant Biosciences:

Q-VANT is a privately held biosciences company that has solved the supply chain problem of QS-21 and other Quillaja-based saponin adjuvants for the global human and animal pharmaceutical markets.  The company’s next-generation technology platform combines computational learning techniques with a proprietary multi-step purification process to increase the supply of QS-21 by more than 1,000 times – enabling the production of billions of doses annually to meet today’s increasing global market demand. Led by a team with unrivaled experience in vaccine and adjuvant development, manufacturing and global regulatory requirements, and with world-class knowledge in Quillaja saponin supply chain, agronomy, extraction and purification, Q-VANT is the first company that is vertically integrated to combine a secured sustainable Quillaja raw material supply with pharma cGMP commercial-scale production of QS-21 and other saponin-based adjuvants. For more information, visit www.q-vant.com.

About In vitro Plant-tech AB: 

In vitro Plant-tech is a research derived company, specializing in development and production of innovative active ingredients using the plant cell cultivation (PCC) technology. This technology enables sustainable production of uniform, customised, high quality plant material. As experts within PCC, we have developed a metabolic enhancement technology (MET) platform which enables optimised production and accumulation of bioactive substances. The company’s products are used in the pharmaceutical, cosmetic, and food industries. The company also provides contract biomanufacturing and production services. For more information, visit www.invitroplanttech.se.