Qatar buys stake in German vaccine-maker

German clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company CureVac said Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) has taken an undisclosed stake in the firm as part of a $126 million financing round, the latest high-profile investor to come onboard ahead of a potential stock market listing, Reuters reports.

The State Fund of the Emirate of Qatar is the third major investor to enter CureVac within weeks of GSK and the German government agreeing to participate in mid-June.

Last month, CureVac announced the closing of its latest private financing round, raising a total of $640 million.

According to the company, the financing round included previously announced equity investments by the German government worth $343 million as well as additional new equity investments from Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) and a group of existing and new investors with approximately $126 million.

Apart from the medical investment, QIA is investing the surplus revenues of the world’s largest exporter of liquefied natural gas.

READ: Pandemic claims more lives in Kuwait, UAE

Meanwhile, in the Middle East, other countries also started to work with European countries to find a vaccine for COVID-19. Last week, Israel announced that it is in advanced negotiations with AstraZeneca for the future purchase of its experimental coronavirus vaccine.

After the outbreak of the pandemic, the experimental coronavirus vaccine being developed by AstraZeneca and Oxford University was safe and produced an immune response in early-stage clinical trials, keeping alive the hope it could be in use by the end of the year.