ViroCell Launched in the UK to Manufacture Viral Vectors

ViroCell will supply viral vectors and gene modified cells, to academic and corporate clients, for translational cell and gene therapies going into clinical trials.

ViroCell Biologics, the UK’s first clinical trial-focused viral vector manufacturer, announced its official launch on April 28, 2021.

ViroCell will aim to be the supplier for viral vectors and gene modified cells, to academic and corporate clients, for translational cell and gene therapies going into clinical trials, the company said in a press release. Currently, the company is in negotiations with teaching hospitals and universities to provide more clean room facilities for the production of viral vectors in the UK.

The contract development and manufacturing organization was first founded in 2020 by the Truell Conservation Foundation and serial biotech entrepreneur, John W. Hadden II, who will serve as CEO. Farzin Farzaneh, PhD, professor of Molecular Medicine at King’s College London, will serve as chief scientific officer.

“We have been studying the viral vector supply-demand imbalance with great interest,” said Edmund Truell, chairman of the Truell Conservation Foundation, in the press release. “We believe that the shortage of highly specialized design and manufacturing capacity and the UK’s hitherto uncommercial attitude to new vector innovation represents a clear barrier to gene therapy innovation. Farzaneh’s leadership in developing and manufacturing viral vectors will build on the excellent genetics research at the Wellcome Sanger Institute, King’s College London, and other world-class centers of academic research, and our globally powerful pharmaceutical sector. We are delighted to capitalize and invest in ViroCell to accelerate the novel therapies that ViroCell’s clients are developing by enabling them to enter clinical trials faster and so help millions of patients.”