The German mRNA specialist BioNTech made a fortune through its alliance with Pfizer. BioNTech launched “Project Lightspeed” in January 2020, days after the SARS-CoV-2 genetic sequence went public. It received €375M from the German government to accelerate development and production. Pfizer declined U.S. government support in the form of Operation Warp Speed R&D funding to preserve scientific independence. Yet the U.S. government placed a $2 billion advance-purchase order for 100 million doses in July 2020, with hundreds of millions more to follow. That purchase guarantee, combined with emergency use authorization in December 2020, helped turn Comirnaty into one of the best-selling pharmaceutical products in history. Comirnaty generated roughly €36B in BioNTech revenue across 2021 and 2022.
In the wake of the pandemic, demand went into freefall. BioNTech’s revenue fell from €19B in 2021 to €118M in the first quarter of 2026. Meanwhile, the political ground shifted beneath the entire mRNA sector. In August 2025, HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. terminated 22 BARDA mRNA vaccine development investments, rejecting the platform outright. The wind-down hit companies and institutions across the sector: contract terminations for Emory University and Tiba Biotech, de-scoping of mRNA work with Luminary Labs, ModeX and Seqirus. It also rejected pre-award proposals from Pfizer, Sanofi Pasteur, CSL Seqirus, Gritstone and others. Kennedy said the data showed mRNA vaccines “fail to protect effectively against upper respiratory infections like COVID and flu.” Researchers at Johns Hopkins, Harvard and the National Academy of Medicine disagreed with those conclusions. But it was clear in 2025 that Trump 2.0, whose prior administration helped support the mRNA vaccine market through Operation Warp Speed purchase commitments, was now actively steering federal dollars away from the technology.
Against such headwinds, BioNTech moved to consolidate. In June 2025, it announced the acquisition of CureVac, a fellow German mRNA company, for $1.25B in stock. CureVac had its own pandemic arc. Its first-generation COVID-19 vaccine candidate showed just 48% efficacy in a Phase 3 trial in 2021. The company, and its partner Bayer, abandoned COVID-19 development as rivals hit the market. CureVac refocused on next-generation mRNA platforms, partnering with GSK. BioNTech called CureVac’s research and manufacturing site in Tübingen a “major prize,” per Fierce Biotech.
Five months after that deal closed, BioNTech announced it is shuttering the Tübingen site, along with facilities in Idar-Oberstein, Marburg and Singapore. In all, some 1,860 jobs will be shed. In addition, BioNTech is exiting in-house COVID vaccine manufacturing entirely, handing all production to Pfizer. The closures are expected to save €500M annually by 2029.
BioNTech still has €16.8B in cash and a bet-the-company oncology pivot, with 15 Phase 3 trials planned by year-end and seven late-stage data readouts expected in 2026. It expects zero oncology revenue this year. In the same earnings call that announced the layoffs, BioNTech also approved a $1B share buyback program.
BioNTech’s exit from infectious disease in nearly complete
As recently as March 2025, BioNTech listed nine infectious disease programs in its clinical pipeline: Comirnaty (COVID-19), a next-generation COVID vaccine, a COVID-influenza combination with Pfizer, a standalone influenza vaccine out-licensed to Pfizer, an HSV vaccine with the University of Pennsylvania, a tuberculosis vaccine funded by the Gates Foundation, a malaria vaccine, an mpox vaccine funded by CEPI, and a shingles vaccine in collaboration with Pfizer. A tenth program, a protein-based therapeutic for bacterial vaginosis, rounded out the non-oncology portfolio.
Today, the company’s public pipeline page lists a single infectious disease program: mpox, funded externally by the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations.
The oncology pipeline, by contrast, has expanded. The live site lists more than 25 Phase 2 and Phase 3 clinical trials and over 10 novel-novel combination studies. Pumitamig (BNT327), a bispecific PD-L1/VEGF-A immunomodulator developed with Bristol Myers Squibb, is the centerpiece, with active trials spanning lung cancer, triple-negative breast cancer, colorectal cancer, gastric cancer, hepatocellular carcinoma and glioblastoma, among others. BioNTech invested €2.1B in R&D in 2025.
On BioNTech’s Q1 2026 earnings call, analyst questions focused on oncology: trial endpoint changes, ASCO data previews, ADC combination strategies, and the CEO succession search. COVID was not raised. CFO Ramón Zapata described the company as being in “an investment phase as we are building BioNTech into a commercial stage, multi-product oncology company by 2030.” The supervisory board is searching for a new CEO with experience in late-stage development and commercialization of pharmaceutical products at scale.
In a way, BioNTech has come full circle. It was founded in 2008 as a cancer immunotherapy company.
Filed Under: Oncology
