Agreements

* On October 29, 2013, Sanofi Pasteur, the vaccines division of Sanofi, has announced a partnership with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to explore and develop new platforms and methods intended to accelerate vaccine R&D, particularly in areas of global health. The announcement was made at the Grand Challenges in Global Health meeting in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil during a session focused on affordable technologies for the developing world. The conference initiated by the Gates Foundation was first held in 2003 to focus on persistent challenges in improving health and development in poor countries.

The Vaccine Discovery Partnership (VxDP) is a newly created, formal mechanism by which the Gates Foundation can directly collaborate with Sanofi Pasteur and other vaccine-pharmaceutical companies across disease areas of interest. It provides an integrated, straight-forward and sustained relationship based on a memorandum of understanding (MOU). This VxDP spearheaded by the Gates Foundation is expected to result in decreased cost and time required to develop successful vaccines.