The collaboration between Wockhardt and Serum Life Sciences UK, a subsidiary of the Serum Institute of India is on a profit-sharing basis and it’s expected to be more profitable than what Wockhardt has signed with the UK government. This was stated by Dr Habib Khorakiwala, Founder & Chairman, Wockhardt while addressing a query at a virtual regional broker meet on Monday.

Earlier, last week Wockhardt and Serum Life Sciences UK had announced a collaboration to set up a new facility to deliver an additional 150 million vaccine doses of multiple vaccines from Wockhardt’s new facility at Wrexham in North Wales.

Natasha Poonawalla, Chairperson, Serum Life Sciences, had stated, “We are delighted to have formed a strategic partnership between Wockhardt and Serum Life Sciences. The collaboration will be instrumental in building long-term capacity in the UK. With this, we seek to further bolster supply resilience and support the global rollout of vaccines.”

Wockhardt UK has manufactured a COVID-19 vaccine in collaboration with UK Government and AstraZeneca. Its collaboration with Serum Life Sciences is an addition to the earlier arrangement.

To a query on whether the demand for COVID-19 vaccines would wane over a period, Dr Khorakiwala stated that there will be demand for booster doses and added that the facility is not restricted to COVID-19 vaccines only. He added that the facility would be ready in the next one-and-a-half year.

On the company’s focus areas, Khorakiwala said the focus is on the current business and biologics is another area especially insulin biologics and vaccines and finally, new drug discovery. These are the key areas for the company going forward.