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The company’s name emerged during the Corona epidemic era, after developing a joint vaccine with “Pfizer”.
Shares of BioNTech Inc fell Monday by more than 6% in morning trading after the German drugmaker shared a bleak 2023 sales forecast for co-developed COVID-19 vaccines with Pfizer.
It comes after BioNTech reported strong quarterly earnings earlier in the morning that beat expectations, but said revenue fell slightly from a year ago due to lower demand for the company’s COVID-19 vaccine, the only product being marketed. The pharmaceutical company expects demand to fall further this year, with vaccine revenues reaching 5 billion euros ($5.4 billion). This represents a sharp drop from 17.3 billion euros, or more than $18 billion, in 2022.
Shares initially fell by 6.4% to their lowest level during the day at $119.98 before rebounding in late trading, offsetting almost all of their losses in extended trading, but shares are still trading near the lowest recorded level since last October at 118 euros.
BioNTech wrote in the earnings release that its efforts to adapt the COVID-19 vaccine to new strains of the virus are expected to drive demand for the product this year. Last fall, the company launched the world’s first Omicron Corona-compatible COVID booster with Pfizer and has sold nearly 550 million doses as of mid-December.
But the company added that it expects fewer initial series vaccines and lower consumption of booster doses this year. BioNTech also said it was renegotiating its supply contract with the EU’s executive body, which could result in vaccine deliveries being spread across multiple years and volume reduced.
The company’s dismal outlook did not weigh on Pfizer’s stock, which closed in the red, albeit with a marginal change.
BioNTech is the latest company to expect a drop in demand for Covid products as the world emerges from the pandemic. Its partner, Pfizer, told investors in January that it expected sales of the Covid vaccine to drop 64% this year and sales of the antiviral Covid treatment known as “Paxlovid” to drop 58%.
BioNTech and Pfizer have become household names during the pandemic after creating one of the first vaccines to become available globally using a technology known as messenger RNA. BioNTech hopes to advance its drug innovation chain and identify efforts to use mRNA technology to treat cancer and other diseases.
“As we look ahead to 2023 and beyond, we plan to continue investing in our transformation with a focus on building commercial capabilities in oncology and working towards registration trials,” the company said in the earnings release. BioNTech added that its “medium-term goal” for this year is to gain approval for several cancer treatment products.
