Vaccine Production Economics

Over the last 10 years, the need to understand and control manufacturing costs has become more relevant to the biopharmaceutical industry. This need for cost controls is no more apparent than for vaccines where the margins are lower compared to that of the rest of the pharmaceutical industry. When evaluating manufacturing cost, one must consider decisions within the context of the global project timeline, as risk and delays can often have a greater impact on the economic viability of a product than the absolute costs themselves. This chapter reviews the interplay between these elements and outlines the techniques used to evaluate the cost implications of manufacturing decisions. Cost of goods (CoGs) and net present value (NPV)-based case studies are discussed. The chapter highlights that modeling is most powerful when it enables sensitivity analyses that identify the importance of the various assumptions and inputs.