Exothera Forms AAV Manufacturing Collaboration

Exothera SA, a contract development and manufacturing organization (CDMO) that specializes in the development and manufacture of viral vectors for vaccines and gene therapies, is teaming up with LogicBio Therapeutics, a genetic medicine company, and Polyplus-transfection SA, a provider of upstream process solutions for advanced biologic and cell and gene therapy production, for the development of a highly scalable adeno-associated virus (AAV) manufacturing platform with a capacity from 200 L to 2,000 L.

AAVs are non-enveloped, non-pathogenic viruses largely used as drug delivery vectors for biotherapeutics, including gene therapies and vaccines.

The collaboration between the involved parties aims to focus on the scale-up of a transient transfection-based AAV serotype 8 (AAV8) manufactured in suspension cell culture. The project looks to assess reproducibility and comparability between different scales of suspension bioreactors, up to a 2,000 L bioreactor scale.

Exothera will be providing the production space (its facility in Jumet, Belgium), process development expertise, and access to enabling technologies. LogicBio will support the initiative with its mAAVRx-branded plasmid technology and its AAV knowledge, while Polyplus will provide transfection reagent expertise with FectoVIR-AAV for good manufacturing practice (GMP)-eligible process development.

"Exothera's team is proud to work with the experienced teams at biotech companies like LogicBio and Polyplus,” says Hanna Lesch, Exothera’s chief technology officer. “The success of AAV-based therapeutics requires a change in the manufacturing paradigm, and through this collaboration, we aim to enable a new approach to consistently scale AAV manufacturing."