The new firm is based in O Porriño, Spain. It is aiming to fast-track fish and shrimp disease prevention strategies through collaborations. The firm’s focus is on autogenous, experimental and licensed vaccines, as well as diagnostic services.

The company’s director – Panos Christofilogiannis – told Animal Pharm it will be launching its Aquanosis diagnostic services in April. This business combines field-validated reverse transcription-PCR diagnostic tests with vaccination programs “to evaluate carrier status before the vaccination, onset of outbreaks and importance of secondary infections to contribute both on disease epidemiology but also on the real field vaccine validation”.

Aquanosis will provide diagnostic services for salmonid alphavirus, pancreas disease virus, infectious pancreas necrosis virus, infectious salmon anemia virus, salmon gill poxvirus, infectious spleen and kidney necrosis virus, Atlantic salmon calicivirus, piscine myocarditis virus and bacterial pathogens. The diagnostics division – in collaboration with Scottish company Vertebrate Antibodies – can produce customized polyclonal and monoclonal antibodies in robust ELISA kits to support the aquaculture industry’s diagnostic requirements.

Aquatreck also aims to launch autogenous vaccines for rainbow trout, sea bass and sea bream in the third quarter of 2019. Dr Christofilogiannis said: “Our team has a close collaboration with Professor Alexandra Adams and we recently achieved funding from the Scottish Aquaculture Innovation Centre and an animal test certificate for field trials to test a novel Flavobacterium psychrophilum vaccine in Rainbow trout farms in the UK.

“The Aquatreck team has experience in producing classic salmonid pathogen vaccines as Professor Patrick Smith is one of the founding developers of fish vaccines started in the late 1970s and CZ Vaccines has been a GMP contract manufacturer for salmonid vaccines since 1994.”

Aquatreck has top-level viral vaccine research and development facilities in Cambridge, UK, sub-unit fish vaccine R&D facilities in Dortmund, Germany, state-of-the-art GMP fish vaccine manufacturing facilities in Spain and close links with a vibrant network of fish immunology and pathology scientists around the world.

“The salmon industry requires new-generation vaccines that are more efficacious – an example is the failure of classic vaccines in Atlantic salmon and rainbow trout – and are developed with improved knowledge on pathogen virulence and novel adjuvants. “The introduction of cleaner fish is changing the epidemiology of the farms and we are ready to develop autogenous and experimental vaccines for these fast-growing new species.

“Our lab in Cambridge has experience in the production of autogenous, experimental viral vaccines that are relevant for halibut and cod, and is doing applied research on novel Atlantic salmon pathogens. “Our research team in Dortmund is developing an exciting pipeline of subunit vaccine candidates against infectious pancreas necrosis virus, viral hemorrhagic septicemia and salmonid alphavirus, and is testing subunit vaccines against Icthyopthirius multifilis, Lepeophtheirus salmonis and Philasterides dicentrarchi under the auspices of the Parafishcontrol EU H2020 Research project.”

CZ Vaccines rebranded earlier this year. It has a commercial presence in more than 65 countries and had turnover of more than €40 million ($45.6 million) in 2017.