Johnson & Johnson to Start Late-stage Coronavirus Vaccine Trial Next Month

Johnson & Johnson announced on Thursday that it would begin largest, late-stage trial testing a potential coronavirus vaccine in September.

The phase three trial would enroll up to 60,000 healthy people ages 18 and older across nearly 180 locations in the U.S. and other countries, according to a J&J spokesman and ClinicalTrials.gov.

The participants will be randomly selected to receive a dose of the potential vaccine or a placebo, according to details of the trial. Researchers will follow them for over two years.

“Our Phase 3 program is intended to be as robust as possible, could include up to 60,000 participants and will be conducted in places with high incidence rates,” J&J spokesman Jake Sargent said in a statement to CNBC. “We are using epidemiology and modeling data to predict and plan where our studies should take place and expect that to be finalized soon.”

J&J also announced this week that it will be buying Momenta Pharmaceuticals for around $6.5 billion in cash in an effort to expand its Janssen unit involvement in autoimmune treatments.

The company will pay $52.50 for each Momenta share, a 70.4% premium to Momenta’s closing price on Tuesday. Shares of Momenta saw a gain of almost 70%, or $21.32 a share, to $52.12 on Tuesday as Wall Street reacted to the news.

Momenta will become part of J&J’s Janssen Pharmaceutical unit, the companies said, with Janssen acquiring Momenta’s pipeline of clinical assets.

“This acquisition broadens Janssen’s leadership in autoimmune diseases and provides us with a major catalyst for sustained growth. Autoantibody-driven diseases are often serious, and patients are underserved by current treatment options,” said Jennifer Taubert, executive vice president, worldwide chairman, pharmaceuticals, Johnson & Johnson.

The deal includes global rights to nipocalimab (M281), a clinically validated anti-FcRn antibody, with J&J noting that plans for additional assets in the Momenta pipeline “will be determined as more data become available, and could offer further upside potential.”

The deal is expected to close in the second half of 2020.

Disclaimer: We have no position in Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) and have not been compensated for this article.