{
  "id": 14623899,
  "title": "Pharma: Investors wanted to buy former Curevac plant - Biontech prefers to close it down",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/10/15/pharma-investoren-wollten-fruheres-curevac-werk-kaufen-biontech-macht",
  "topic": "health",
  "section": "Health & Medicine",
  "published": "2026-10-15T05:48:00.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Handelsblatt",
    "slug": "handelsblatt",
    "url": "https://www.handelsblatt.com/unternehmen/industrie/pharma-biontech-schliesst-frueheres-curevac-werk-trotz-millionen-angebot/100260007.html"
  },
  "original_language": "de",
  "account": "Biontech has shut down its Tübingen facility despite an offer of up to €20 million from an investor consortium led by Peter Löw. The consortium, which included a German real estate group, an investment company, and US biotech firm Alloy Therapeutics, had planned to take over the site, which was previously part of Curevac, and produce human and animal medicines using mRNA technology. The negotiations, which began in May, ultimately failed, with Biontech citing concerns that the consortium's business plan was not viable. All 500 employees at the site will leave the company by the end of February 2027.",
  "summary": "Internal documents suggest that the vaccine manufacturer negotiated for months about the sale of its mRNA laboratories in Tübingen - and then broke off. The million-dollar offer had a catch.",
  "key_points": [
    "Biontech closes Tübingen mRNA factory despite consortium's 20M euro offer",
    "Consortium led by Peter Löw, real estate group, Alloy Therapeutics failed to buy plant",
    "Biontech declined to comment, employees receive severance by Feb 2027"
  ],
  "editors_take": "Biontech's refusal to sell the Tübingen facility signals a strategic preference for total site closures over fostering domestic mRNA competitors through potentially unstable third-party business models.",
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}