Three COVID-19 Technology Licensing Agreements Confirmed

The World Health Organization (WHO) today announced it signed new licensing agreements related to innovative vaccine technologies.

The COVID-19 Technology Access Pool (C-TAP) is a multi-stakeholder partnership that facilitates sharing of intellectual property, knowledge, and innovations.

On August 29, 2023, it announced that three new licensing agreements were acquired through the Medicines Patent Pool (MPP).

These agreements include the following licenses to transfer know-how, materials, and clinical data needed in different countries:     

Medigen Vaccine Biologics Corp is offering its patent and know-how for a COVID-19 vaccine that has seen more than three million doses administered across seven countries. The agreement will enable licensing to facilitate technology transfer and staff training.

Spanish National Research Council is sharing a second license for a COVID-19 vaccine prototype. 

The University of Chile is sharing its technology for a COVID-19 assay to quantify neutralizing antibodies.

"COVID-19 is here to stay, and the world will continue to need tools to prevent it, test for it and treat it," commented Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO Director-General, in a media release.

"Through C-TAP, WHO and our partners are committed to making those tools accessible to everyone, everywhere. I am grateful to the leadership shown by those license holders who have contributed technology."

C-TAP was launched in May 2020 by the WHO and the Government of Costa Rica with the support of 44 Member States, UN Development Programme, Unitaid, UNAIDS, and implementing partners such as MPP.  

It works under the principles of the Solidarity call to action and was designed to serve as a platform for developers of COVID-19 therapeutics, diagnostics, vaccines, and other health products to voluntarily share their intellectual property, knowledge, and data to accelerate technological innovation and expand global production capacity.

Furthermore, C-TAP has played an important role in raising awareness of the role of technology and knowledge sharing and access-oriented voluntary licensing.  

Charles Gore, Executive Director of the Medicines Patent Pool, added, "Access to essential medicines and health technologies needs to remain a top priority on the global health agenda." 

C-TAP has also established a Technology Access Pool database with a searchable repository. With a principle of transparency, this publicly available database will support coordination. It will link to other data-sharing platforms where clinical, regulatory, patent, and manufacturer data is available for selected technologies. 

The WHO is preparing to share findings of the review of C-TAP and a proposed model for an evolved technology access pool. Stakeholders can comment on a concept paper, including the process and timelines for its implementation.

WHO technical teams support by providing assessment of technologies to technology givers and receivers. This includes the recently launched WHO-Unitaid briefing document to support navigating public health and intellectual property interfaces.