The Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) and Hetero, one of India's generic pharmaceutical companies, have agreed to produce over 100 million doses of Sputnik V Covid-19 vaccine in India every year.
The companies aim to begin producing the Sputnik V vaccine at the beginning of 2021.
Murali Krishna Reddy, Director, International Marketing, Hetero Labs Limited said in a statement, "We are pleased to collaborate with RDIF as a manufacturing partner for the most anticipated Sputnik V vaccine for the treatment of Covid-19.”
"This collaboration is another step towards our commitment in the battle against Covid-19 and realizing the objective of 'Make-in-India' campaign as envisioned by our Prime Minister of India, said Reddy.
As per the RDIF report, Russia’s Coronavirus vaccine candidate Sputnik V has shown 95% efficacy in the interim clinical trial results. The data was obtained on the 42nd day after the first dose.
More than 50 countries have requested for over 1.2 billion doses of Sputnik V vaccine while currently the third phase clinical trials have been approved for Sputnik V. The Phase III trials are ongoing in Belarus, the UAE, Venezuela and other countries, as well as Phase II-III in India.
The vaccine supplies for the global market will be produced by RDIF's international partners in India, Brazil, China, South Korea and other countries.
Kirill Dmitriev, CEO of the Russian Direct Investment Fund, in a statement, said, "We are delighted to announce the agreement between RDIF and Hetero that will pave the way to the production of the safe and highly effective Sputnik V vaccine on Indian soil.”
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"Thanks to our cooperation with Hetero, we will be able to significantly increase production capacity and provide people of India with an efficient solution in this challenging period of the pandemic," Dmitriev added.
The Russian vaccine uses two different vectors based on the human adenovirus, rather than using the same vector for two doses.