● SK bioscience Winner of "2018 Osong New Drug Awards"

- For developing cell culture vaccine, shingles vaccine, and chickenpox vaccine- Wins awards for 3rd consecutive year… 2016 to 2018


SK bioscience has won the honor of the 2018 Osong New Drug Awards for import-substituting major vaccines.

The company announced on September 6 that it was the winner of the highest honor of the Minister＇s Award in the 2018 Osong New Drug Awards granted by the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety to companies in the pharmaceutical, biotech, and medical industries.

The awards, the tenth year since their inception in 2009, support companies in the drug, biotech, and healthcare industries in accelerating their new drug development efforts. SK bioscience was recognized for its contribution in developing vaccines. Back in 2016 when SK biosciencewas part of SK chemicals, as well as in 2017, the company grabbed the same award in the vaccine and biotech category.

Since its development of Korea＇s first trivalent cell culture flu vaccine in 2014, SK bioscience has developed the world＇s first quadrivalent cell culture flu vaccine, followed by the development of a shingles vaccine (the world＇s second) and chickenpox vaccine (Korea＇s second).

Since its launch three years ago, sales of SK’s flu vaccine have reached 14 million doses (each dose represents one injection). Now the company is bidding for internationalvaccine supply tenders after acquiring a prequalification status from the World HealthOrganization.

The shingles vaccine introduced in December last year contributed meaningfully to stabilizing the market that had been dominated by international drug suppliers, while giving a wider range of choices for patients. The company is currently working on acquiring licenses for supplying the vaccine to countries in Southeast Asia including Thailand.

As for the chickenpox vaccine for which SK biosciencesecured a license to sell in Korea from the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety, the company plans to launch it in the second half of this year while at the same time taking part in international vaccine supply tenders.

In addition, the company has built solid working relationships with international private and public entities such as Sanofi Pasteur, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the International Vaccine Institute, and PATH.

SK bioscienceis adding to its global reputation with proprietary vaccines that are already in the market, next-generation vaccines in joint development with international entities, and its state-of-the-art vaccine labs.

Ahn Jae-yong, CEO of SK bioscience, said, "We are finally seeing the fruits of our vaccine development efforts for the past ten years. Just like our vision of becoming a global leader in vaccine technology, we are committed to making SK bioscience the world＇s best vaccine company."

At "L House," the state-of-the-art vaccine production labs in Andong, Korea, the scientists and technicians of SK bioscience are producing vaccines in quantities based on cell culture, germiculture, gene recombination, and protein conjugate technologies.




# SK bioscience CEO Ahn Jae-yong (right) receives the 2018 Osong New Drug Awards from Lee Sun-hee, Director General of the National Institute of Food and Drug Safety Evaluation.