After so much hype, it turns out vaccine manufacturer Novavax’s long-awaited COVID jab hit the market far too late.
In its second quarter earnings on Monday, Novavax announced sales of just $186 million for the quarter, far below analyst expectations of $1.02 billion, according to FactSet. The Maryland-based company also halved its revenue forecast and now expects sales for 2022 to fall between $2 billion and $2.3 billion, instead of the $4 billion to $5 billion it predicted earlier this year. The company lost $510 million this quarter, compared to a loss of $352 million this time a year ago. Shares in the vaccine manufacturer crashed over 30% in after-hours trading.
Novavax CEO Stanley Erck blamed the company’s poor sales on a current glut of vaccine doses, leading governments to delay or suspend orders. Even COVAX, the international initiative to bring COVID vaccines to developing countries, has more vaccines than it needs right now. Erck told the Wall Street Journal that COVAX had walked away from an order of 350 million Novavax doses due to an oversupply from other manufacturers.
That surplus is a disappointment to Novavax, which was much slower in bringing its vaccine to market than competitors Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson.
Late to market
In July 2020, Novavax received $1.6 billion from the U.S. government as part of Operation Warp Speed, the Trump administration’s initiative to fund COVID vaccine development. In exchange, Novavax promised to produce 100 million doses of a COVID vaccine. At the time, Novavax had yet to bring a product to market, unlike other Warp Speed recipients like Johnson & Johnson.
Novavax ultimately developed a two-dose COVID vaccine and secured Food and Drug Administration approval, but it did so months after its rivals due to manufacturing delays and regulatory hiccups. Indonesia was the first government to approve the Novavax vaccine on Nov. 1, 2021, followed by India, the European Union, Japan,…