J&J Nears Deal for Aspen to Make Own-Brand Vaccine for Africa

Johnson & Johnson and Aspen Pharmacare Holdings Ltd. have agreed on terms that may lead to a licensing deal allowing the South African drug company to make its own-branded Covid-19 vaccine and decide on the recipients of the doses it produces.

The agreement, confirmed by Aspen in a statement Tuesday, would extend an existing deal for it to package and fill vials of the U.S. company’s shots at a plant in South Africa. The development comes as the emergence of the omicron variant again highlights the need for better global vaccine equality, with African nations trailing more developed countries on coronavirus inoculations.

Aspen, Africa’s largest drugmaker, has capacity to manufacture as many as 300 million doses of the J&J shot and plans to increase that over time to more than 700 million by January 2023.

Shares in the Durban, South Africa-based company rose 5.9% as of 2:15 p.m. in Johannesburg, bringing the gain this year to more than 89%.