Abstract

Money for Science or Science for Money? BioNTech and Moderna in the Development of the mRNA Covid-19 Vaccines

In January 2020, when SARS-CoV-2 was identified, two product-less biopharma companies, US-based Moderna and Germany-based BioNTech, that had invested in mRNA technologies with a view to developing personalized cancer drugs, shifted strategy to the development of mRNA Covid-19 vaccines. Moderna collaborated with US NationaI Institutes of Health and BioNTech with US-based Pfizer. In December 2020, the US regulator gave both vaccines emergency-use authorization (EUA). In comparing the two young companies, one can say that Moderna needs science to make money whereas BioNTech needs money to make science. Founded in 2010, Moderna’s 2018 IPO was the largest in biotech history. Venture-backed by Flagship Pioneering, its CEO, Noubar Afeyan, hired Stéphane Bancel as Moderna CEO in 2011. At the IPO, Moderna had 21 drugs in development, with no expectation of a product launch for several years. Bancel was a hyper-aggressive fundraiser, with Moderna securing $2 billion in private equity and another $600 million in the IPO. From May 2020, seven months before the Moderna vaccine received EUA, Flagship and Moderna senior executives began selling their shares. By April 2021, the stock sales of Afeyan were $1.4 billion, and the 2021 compensation of the top five executives totaled $362 million. In terms of personal profiteering from the stock market, BioNTech was the antithesis of Moderna. Founded in Mainz in 2008 with its NASDAQ IPO in 2019, BioNTech’s strength resided in the strategic control exercised by its scientist husband-and-wife founders Uğur Şahin as CEO and Özlem Türeci as CMO, Reportedly, through 2021, they had not sold any of their shares. As an innovative enterprise, BioNTech excelled in organizational integration, mobilizing the skills and efforts of personnel to engage in collective and cumulative learning. BioNTech’s sources of financial commitment were far smaller than funds available to Moderna but far more impactful on vaccine development.