TIANJIN, CHINA, March 17, 2020, CanSino Biologics Inc. (“CanSinoBIO”, HK6185), an innovative biopharmaceutical company dedicated to vaccine R&D and commercialization, announced today that its Recombinant Novel Coronavirus Vaccine (Adenovirus Type 5 Vector) candidate (“Ad5-nCoV”), co-developed with Beijing Institute of Biotechnology (BIB), has been approved to enter into Phase 1 Clinical Trial. It is currently the first novel coronavirus vaccine for COVID-19 that made to this stage in China.

“Thanks to our collaborators and our diligent team, who worked almost around clock since late January to develop this vaccine candidate with sound scientific data to support IND filing,” said Xuefeng Yu, Chairman and CEO of CanSinoBIO, “Having committed to provide unconditional support to fight against the global pandemic, CanSinoBIO is determined to launch our vaccine product candidate as soon as possible with no compromise on quality and safety.”

The vaccine candidate is built upon CanSinoBIO’s adenovirus-based viral vector vaccine technology platform, which has also been successfully applied to develop the globally innovative vaccine against Ebola virus infection. Results from preclinical animal studies of “Ad5-nCoV” show that the vaccine candidate can induce strong immune response in animal models. The preclinical animal safety studies demonstrated a good safety profile.

Since the outbreak of Novel Coronavirus in the past January, CanSinoBIO immediately initiated the project in collaboration with BIB. We have completed the necessary preclinical steps for vaccine R&D. To date, the GMP clinical batches have passed quality testing and are ready for Phase 1 Clinical Trial.

About CanSinoBIO

Incorporated in 2009, CanSinoBIO (6185.HK) commits to research, production and commercialization of innovative vaccines for China and global public health security. It possesses four integrated platform technologies including adenovirus-based vectors, conjugation, protein design and recombination and formulation. As of today, it has established a robust pipeline of 16 vaccines covering 13 diseases, including a globally innovative Ebola virus vaccine approved for marketing in 2017 as well as the investigational Recombinant Novel Coronavirus Vaccine (Adenovirus Type 5 Vector).