Why are we highlighting the Animal Health Industry this month? 

1. Food Security: The health of livestock and other animals is directly linked to global food security. Healthy animals contribute to the stability of food systems by ensuring a steady supply of meat, dairy, and other animal products. By focusing on innovations in animal health, Eyam can help prevent diseases that could disrupt food production, ensuring a more resilient global food chain.
2. Zoonotic Diseases: Many diseases that affect humans originate from animals (zoonotic diseases), including viruses like SARS, MERS, and COVID-19. Developing vaccines and therapies to protect animals from these diseases reduces the risk of transmission to humans, supporting global public health efforts.
3. Business Opportunities: The animal health sector is a rapidly growing market with significant commercial potential. Innovations in vaccines and treatments for animals present new business avenues, not only for combating diseases but also for enhancing the overall well-being of pets and livestock, opening up opportunities for partnerships and expansion in this sector.

This month, Eyam is poised to begin 2 new partnership studies with large animal health pharmaceuticals. The details are still confidential, but there are several reasons why animal health pharmaceuticals are excited about Eyam’s technologies:

1. Cost of Goods: One of the most compelling advantages of Eyam’s DNA vaccine technology is its exceptionally low cost of production. Manufacturing these vaccines is highly scalable, and for Eyam’s product, the cost per dose may be as low as pennies on the dollar. This cost-efficiency is a major benefit in the animal health sector, where large-scale vaccinations are often necessary, making Eyam’s technology a game-changer for widespread disease prevention at an affordable price.
2. Stability: Eyam’s DNA plasmid technology offers unparalleled stability, even under challenging conditions. The plasmids can be frozen and thawed multiple times without losing efficacy, maintaining their structural integrity. Moreover, they remain stable for longer periods and at higher temperatures compared to traditional vaccines. This makes distribution and storage more flexible, especially in regions with limited refrigeration capabilities, reducing logistical barriers in animal health applications.
3. Durability: Eyam’s self-amplifying technologies offer a significant advantage in terms of prolonged expression power. This means that the vaccines can induce a stronger and longer-lasting immune response in animals, offering extended protection compared to conventional products. For animal health pharmaceuticals, this extended protection reduces the frequency of vaccinations or therapeutics, enhancing convenience for veterinarians and farmers while improving animal welfare.

These factors make Eyam’s platform highly attractive for the animal health industry, poised to revolutionize how vaccines are produced, stored, and administered. 

As an Eyam shareholder, why should you be excited about our penetration into this market?

• Market Accessibility & Cost Efficiency

Global Reach: The extremely low cost of goods, with production potentially as low as pennies per dose, allows Eyam’s vaccines to be deployed at scale, particularly in regions with limited financial resources. In markets like livestock farming, where mass vaccination is often needed, this affordability becomes a key differentiator. For developing nations or large-scale agricultural sectors, this cost efficiency opens up opportunities to ensure widespread immunization without the financial strain typically associated with high-tech vaccines.

Potential for Public-Private Partnerships: Given the cost benefits, Eyam is working to collaborate with governmental and non-governmental organizations focused on global health, food security, and animal welfare. These partnerships can help expand Eyam’s reach, particularly in markets where animal diseases threaten food supply chains.

• Extended Market Penetration with Durability

Fewer Interventions, Better Coverage: With Eyam’s self-amplifying technologies offering long-lasting immune protection, farmers and veterinarians need to vaccinate animals less frequently. This reduces labor and operational costs, particularly in industries such as poultry, cattle, and aquaculture, where large numbers of animals need regular care. Longer-lasting vaccines also ensure better compliance and greater overall coverage in the animal population, reducing the chances of disease outbreaks.

Niche Markets for High-Value Livestock: For high-value livestock (such as dairy cows, thoroughbred horses, or race animals), the durability and reliability of Eyam’s vaccines provide an attractive proposition. These animals require maximum health protection to maintain productivity, and longer-lasting vaccines help ensure minimal disruptions due to illness.

• Strategic Partnerships in Established Markets

Collaborations with Major Animal Health Players: The global animal health market is dominated by a few large players. Eyam’s advanced vaccine platforms make it a valuable partner for these industry leaders, offering cutting-edge solutions that address some of the fundamental challenges in animal health, such as vaccine durability, efficacy, and production costs.

Licensing Opportunities: With strong intellectual property around these platforms, Eyam has the potential to license its technologies for specific applications across various species and diseases. Licensing to larger pharmaceutical firms with established global networks could fast-track Eyam’s technologies into the mainstream market while generating significant revenue streams.

• Meeting the Needs of Emerging Health Threats

Zoonotic Disease Prevention: As many animal diseases also pose risks to human health, Eyam’s platform could play a crucial role in preventing zoonotic diseases. Vaccines developed using Eyam’s technologies could be instrumental in managing diseases that have the potential to jump from animals to humans, offering long-term protection against emerging threats like avian influenza, swine flu, or even future coronaviruses.

Responding to Climate Impacts: As the changing climate drives the spread of diseases across different regions, the flexibility and durability of Eyam’s vaccines make them well-suited to rapidly evolving disease landscapes. This positions Eyam as a key player in adapting to new health challenges driven by global environmental changes.

• Sustainability and Ethical Standards

Reducing Antibiotic Use: Long-lasting vaccines contribute to reducing the need for antibiotics in animal health, aligning with global initiatives to combat antimicrobial resistance (AMR). Eyam’s technology can provide alternative solutions to antibiotics, positioning the company as a leader in sustainable animal health practices.

Animal Welfare: With fewer vaccinations required and longer protection provided, Eyam’s products aim to reduce the stress on animals from repeated handling and interventions. This not only improves animal welfare but also could enhance the overall productivity of farms and animal health operations.

The Animal Health  industry safeguards the health of livestock and companion animals, ensuring food security, mitigating zoonotic diseases, and supporting the broader global economy. Now, with Eyam’s novel nucleic acid platforms, we are poised to make a transformative impact. Our cutting-edge, low-cost, and long-lasting solutions promise to reshape how the industry approaches animal health, offering a future where prevention, accessibility, and efficacy go hand in hand.

The Animal Health Industry: An Overview

The global animal health market is a thriving, rapidly expanding sector, valued at over $50 billion in 2023, and showing no signs of slowing down. This industry spans a wide range of products, from vaccines and therapeutics to diagnostics and feed additives. Traditionally, the focus has been on managing diseases that threaten animal productivity, particularly in livestock, which directly impacts human food supply.

However, the landscape is evolving. In recent years, there has been a shift toward more innovative, sustainable, and humane disease control methods. Vaccines and biologics are rising to the forefront, fueled by increasing awareness of zoonotic diseases (those that can jump from animals to humans), regulatory pressures to reduce antibiotic use, and growing demand for higher standards of animal welfare. This is a sector ripe for disruption—and Eyam’s technology is poised to deliver exactly that.

The Economics Behind the Industry

What drives the animal health industry is the increasing global demand for protein. As populations grow, particularly in emerging markets, livestock production has surged, and with it, the need for comprehensive disease management strategies. The days of using antibiotics as a blanket preventative measure are fading; instead, vaccines and other biologics are becoming the new standard for ensuring healthy herds and flocks.

In 2023 alone, the global market for animal vaccines was valued at approximately $12 billion, with projections of a 6.5% annual growth rate over the next five years. This growth is fueled by the demand for safer, more effective, and environmentally sustainable disease prevention methods. Meanwhile, therapeutic products targeting chronic conditions in pets and livestock are also seeing increased demand, driven by consumer expectations for better care and long-term solutions.

This presents a unique opportunity for companies like Eyam, which are positioned to offer not only more effective treatments but also affordable and scalable solutions that can meet the rising global need.

The Importance of Preventive Medicine in Animal Health

Preventive medicine is rapidly becoming the cornerstone of the animal health industry. The old saying holds true: an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. This shift toward prevention over treatment is not just a trend; it’s a necessity. For livestock producers, diseases like Bovine Respiratory Disease (BRD) or Foot-and-Mouth Disease (FMD) can devastate entire herds, leading to massive economic losses. Preventive vaccination programs are critical not only for reducing mortality but also for ensuring the sustainability of livestock operations worldwide.

In the companion animal sector, preventive care is just as important. Pet owners increasingly understand the value of routine vaccinations for diseases such as rabies and parvovirus. These vaccinations not only protect their pets but also serve a broader public health purpose by preventing zoonotic disease transmission. Recent studies show that every dollar invested in preventive care can save up to five dollars in future veterinary treatment costs.

Eyam’s self-amplifying DNA platform is uniquely suited to meet this growing demand. Our vaccines offer longer-lasting protection, requiring fewer doses and reducing overall costs for both producers and pet owners, all while maintaining exceptional efficacy.

The Search for Nucleic Acid Technologies

Nucleic acid technologies, like RNA and DNA-based vaccines, have gained widespread recognition in the human health sector, and they are now making their way into animal health. These technologies offer several key advantages: faster development, the ability to customize for specific pathogens, and more efficient manufacturing processes.

However, despite their promise, the adoption of nucleic acid vaccines in the animal health industry has been slow. The main barriers have been the high costs of production and the need for complex cold storage systems. This is where Eyam’s technology offers a game-changing solution.

Eyam’s Disruptive Approach: Low-Cost, Long-Lasting Self-Amplifying DNA Platforms

At Eyam, we have developed a disruptive platform that addresses the core limitations of traditional nucleic acid technologies. Our Gemini Self-Amplifying DNA platform offers the following advantages:

1. Lower Cost of Production: Eyam’s self-amplifying DNA platform requires significantly smaller doses than traditional vaccines. This drastically reduces production costs, making it a more viable option for widespread use in livestock and companion animals, particularly in resource-constrained regions.
2. No Cold Chain Required: Unlike most mRNA vaccines, our DNA-based vaccines are stable at ambient temperatures. This eliminates the need for expensive cold storage and transportation systems, which are significant barriers to vaccine distribution, especially in rural areas.
3. Longer Duration of Efficacy: Our platform enables vaccines and therapeutics to have a much longer duration of action, which means fewer doses are needed. This not only reduces costs for producers but also increases the practicality of disease prevention on a large scale.
4. Versatility Across Species and Pathogens: Our Gemini platform is adaptable to a wide range of pathogens and can be tailored to different animal species, making it a flexible tool for addressing multiple health challenges within the animal kingdom.

Eyam’s Role in the Future of Animal Health

The global animal health industry is growing, driven by economic pressures and the need for better disease control. Eyam is positioned at the forefront of this movement, offering transformative solutions that are not only cost-effective but also scalable and long-lasting. Our entrance into the animal health sector isn’t just a business opportunity—it’s a commitment to improving animal welfare, advancing global public health, and securing the future of our food systems.

Thank you for your continued trust and support as we forge new paths in innovation. Together, we are shaping the future of both human and animal health.