With countries stocking up on its Covid-19 vaccines and ordering more for the rest of the year, its forecast for full-year sales of its vaccine was raised by Pfizer Inc on Wednesday by almost 29 per cent to $33.5 billion. Pfizer partnered with Germany’s BioNTech to develop the vaccine.

While reaffirming that a booster dose of its vaccine would likely be needed in the future, the company said that it would probably be applying for an emergency use authorization for a potential booster dose as early as August.

Signed deals for 2.1 billion doses of the vaccine formed the basis for the raised sales forecast of the vaccine and the company said that the forecast would be further increased if it signs more deals.

 In the race among pharma companies to come up with a vaccine for Covid-19, Pfizer was the first to get an emergency authorization from the United States drug controller in December last year for its vaccine and has since been ahead of its rivals, most of whom have faced issues with production. Safety concerns have also put Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine under scrutiny.

Last week, J&J forecast revenue from its vaccine sale for the full year to be $2.5 billion, while Moderna put that number at $19.2 billion.

Since December 1 billion doses of the vaccine have been shipped by it, Pfizer said. a production target of around 3 billion doses for this year has been set by the companies.

“Prior to the pandemic, Pfizer produced approximately 200 million doses annually across our entire Vaccines portfolio,” Pfizer’s Chief Executive Officer Albert Bourla said in prepared remarks ahead of a conference call.

The company said that the critical factors to ensure ramping up of the production would be the expansion of its current production capacities as well as roping in new suppliers and contract manufacturers for its vaccine.

There are also plans of the companies to conduct clinical trials of a new version of the vaccine targeting the fast-spreading Delta variant of the virus sometime next month. Pfizer said that it has already manufactured the first batch of the new version of the vaccine,.  

Last week, an order for 200 million more doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine was placed by the United States as a part of pediatric vaccination as well as bolstering shots for the adult [population of the country if needed.

Pfizer records most of the combined sales from the vaccine, and splits expenses and profit 50-50 with BioNTech.

The adjusted profit for the full year was also raised by Pfizer to between $3.95 and $4.05 per share, compared to its earlier forecast of it being in between $3.55 and $3.65 per share.

(Adapted from LiveMint.com)