BERLIN (Reuters) – Germany’s BioNTech on Monday said it would likely take write-downs of up to 900 million euros ($947 million) in the third quarter after its partner Pfizer reported similar charges on their COVID-19 vaccine business last week.
Pfizer on Friday said it will take $900 million of inventory write-offs and other charges for the jointly developed vaccine, branded as Comirnaty, on top of much larger write-offs on Pfizer’s own COVID treatment Paxlovid.
BioNTech will likely “recognize the effect of Pfizer’s inventory write-offs and other charges related to Comirnaty in the third quarter of 2023 up to 0.9 billion euros, which represents BioNTech’s half of the gross profit-sharing agreement with Pfizer”, it said in a statement.
BioNTech, which is entitled to receive vaccine-related profit share payments from its U.S. partner, said the write-offs would also reduce its 2023 revenues.
A BioNTech spokesperson on Monday declined to comment on the company’s current outlook, which is for COVID-19 vaccine revenues of about 5 billion euros in 2023.
The company is scheduled to release detailed third-quarter figures on Nov. 6.
($1 = 0.9498 euros)
(Reporting by Ludwig Burger and Rachel More, Editing by Miranda Murray)
