Vaccino Reithera, the Court of Auditors: “Irreconcilable investment project for general purposes or to strengthen business”

One week after the decision not to register the decree which provided for the financing of the development of the Reithera vaccine, conceived in Italy with the collaboration ofSpallanzani Institute, the reasons for the Court of Auditors which effectively blocked the continuation of the experimentation that was in phase 2 of the compound. For the judges, “the absence of a valid and sufficient productive investment, pursuant to art. 5, 14 and 15 of the Ministerial Decree of 9 December 2014, did not allow the deed in question to be admitted to the legitimacy approval “. The decision of the magistrates led to the refusal of the visa and the consequent registration of the decree of Ministry of Economic Development. The development agreement was signed on February 17, 2021 by Mise, the National Agency for the attraction of investments and business development – Invitalia and by the Reithera Company, aimed at supporting the industrial development program to be carried out at the production plant located in Castel Romano (Rome).

“In particular, this program included a investment project aimed at expanding the production plant site in Castel Romano and an industrial research and experimental development project intended to complete the clinical trial (phase 2 and 3 clinical trials) of the anti Covid-19 vaccine – reads the note -. The section considered the proposed investment project irreconcilable with the condition set by art. 15, paragraph 1, of the Ministerial Decree of 9 December 2014, according to which the expenses are admissible ‘to the extent necessary for the purposes of the project subject to the request for subsidies’ and not, as is instead shown by the project presented, for general purposes – production or research, also on behalf of third parties – pursued by Reithera, nor for the even more general purposes of strengthening the equity consistency of the company “. “The productive investment project, in fact, pursuant to art. 14, paragraph 2, of the aforementioned DM it cannot concern the entire company complex but only certain ‘production units ”, it is specified.

“The purchase of the ownership of the operational headquarters of the company, located in Castel Romano (Rome), for an estimated amount of € 4,000,000.00, does not pertain to the single ‘production unit’, represented by creating a filling and packaging plant, as claimed by the administration, but concerns the entire headquarters where the company carries out all its activities which ‘in 2019 essentially concerned research and development activities on behalf of the parent company Keires AG’, as reported in the same Invitalia Report . The inadmissibility of the investment project consisting of the purchase of the ownership of the company’s operational headquarters does not allow, therefore – it concludes -, according to the Section, the sole investment represented by the construction of the filling and packaging plant, for an amount 7,734,126.68 euros, to reach the minimum threshold of 10 million euros prescribed by art. 5, paragraph 3, of the Ministerial Decree of 9 December 2014, for the validity of the productive investment. The absence of a valid and sufficient productive investment, pursuant to art. 5, 14 and 15 of the Ministerial Decree of 9 December 2014, has therefore not allowed the deed in question to be admitted to the legitimacy approval “.

“Phase 3 of the vaccine trial it depends on Reithera and investments. Today we await the reasons for the decision of the Court of Auditors, but we are ready to resume our work. However, the resumption of the experimentation will have to be evaluated by those who finance the study. As Spallanzani we are ready and available ”he declared Francesco Vaia, director of Inmi Spallanzani, guest of ‘Agorà on Rai3

–