Celltrion Awarded up to $626 Million From the Department of Defense to Supply COVID-19 Point-of-Care (POC) Rapid Antigen Test Kits
- Celltrion wins contract from DLA to supply rapid antigen test kits
- 12-month supply for as much as USD 626 million to start next month
- Celltrion becomes first Korean mass supplier of COVID-19 rapid test kits after proving quality, supply capabilities, price competitiveness
INCHEON, South Korea–(BUSINESS WIRE)– Celltrion (KRX:068270) announced today that the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) under the Department of Defense has awarded Celltrion USA, Inc., a subsidiary company of Celltrion, a procurement contract for its DiaTrustTM COVID-19 Ag Rapid Test.
Celltrion USA will make deliveries to approximately 25,000 U.S. CONUS locations to support military bases, long-term care facilities, community testing sites, critical infrastructure, and other designated places on a weekly basis.
The DLA estimates its order volume to be as much as $626 million considering the change in demand by the COVID-19 community transmission rate in the U.S.
Celltrion believes that this procurement contract underscores Celltrion’s quality, production and supply capabilities as the deal has been awarded after the Department of Defense’s rigorous verification. Celltrion has already proven the quality and safety of DiaTrustTM earlier this year as the product obtained Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) on April 16. Celltrion’s supply capability for the contract volume is sufficiently supported by the large-scale production facility in Korea. In addition, Celltrion USA emphasized the firm’s drug distribution performance in the US market for the last three years to demonstrate its ability to perform timely deliveries to 25,000 designated places in the U.S., at a competitive price.
Unlike other COVID-19 Antigen Rapid Test kits, DiaTrustTM is a product that applied two antibodies binding COVID-19 virus to both N-protein and S-protein, respectively, resulting in improved sensitivity of 93.3% and specificity of 99.0%. Also, the infection can be diagnosed within only 15 minutes.
The test kits to be supplied through this contact are point-of-care tests (POCT) which can only be used in the presence of medical professionals.
“The fact that we were awarded a procurement contract by the DLA after having passed its strict screen process is a recognition of Celltrion’s technology and supply capability. With the COVID-19 pandemic still not showing signs of waning, we plan to focus on executing this contract as diligently as possible and further solidify the external credibility of Celltrion’s diagnostic test kits portfolio,” said Bonjoong Kim, CEO of Celltrion USA.
About Celltrion, Inc.
Headquartered in Incheon, Korea, Celltrion is a leading biopharmaceutical company, specializing in research, development and manufacturing of biosimilar and innovative drugs. Celltrion strives to provide more affordable biosimilar mAbs to patients who previously had limited access to advanced therapeutics. Celltrion received FDA and EC’s approval for Inflectra® and Remsima®, respectively, which is the world’s first mAb biosimilar to receive approval from a regulatory agency in a developed country. Also Celltrion received FDA and EC’s approval for Truxima® and Herzuma®. Its products are manufactured at state-of-the-art mammalian cell culture facilities, designed and built to comply with the US FDA cGMP and the EU GMP guidelines.
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20210923005328/en/
Contacts
Celltrion, Inc.
Eunyoung Lee, +82 32 850 4384