Leading Forward: Key Takeaways from 2025 and Priorities for 2026

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Leadership

Author: Thomas Lingelbach, Chief Executive Officer

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In conversation with – Thomas Lingelbach, Chief Executive Officer

The start of a new year offers a natural moment for contemplation to both reflect on the year that has just passed and look forward to what lies ahead. At the beginning of what promises to be an exciting year for Valneva, our Chief Executive Officer, Thomas Lingelbach, shares his key lessons from 2025 and offers his predictions for a pivotal year ahead.

2025, a year that demonstrated Valneva’s resilience and progress

Looking back on the last twelve months at Valneva, I feel an enormous sense of pride in how the company has responded to a complex and evolving environment. Our dedicated teams have demonstrated a strong level of responsiveness, and while holding ourselves to high ethical standards, we were able to pivot quickly and adapt to new realities – ultimately strengthening the foundations of the business.

Faced with unforeseen challenges, we took necessary decisions including reprioritizing our investments or consolidation of our corporate footprint. This allows us to improve cashflows without materially compromising our key strategic prospects. I consider it a major achievement that, ahead of Lyme data, we were able to refinance our debt – an outcome many thought would be difficult to achieve. The nearly 40% increase in our share price over the past year, representing a 107% year-on-year increase, is further testament to the sustained trust and credibility we’ve built amongst investors, putting Valneva in a solid position for the year ahead.

Driving R&D progress in an evolving environment

While shifts in the geopolitical environment continue to challenge vaccine developers, interest in what our industry can deliver remains incredibly high. You only need to look at the sheer number of mergers and acquisitions that took place in the vaccine space in 2025 to see the industry’s appetite for innovation in this space.

The emergence of novel second and third generation vaccines for existing indications in 2025 reflects how many companies are seeking to improve on what has come before, both in terms of efficacy and safety. From Valneva’s perspective, we’re continuing to focus on our innovation agenda – pursuing candidates that could be first, best or only in their class. To this end we’ve made major progress both in the early stages of our pipeline development and our clinical stage assets.

Strategic readiness for 2026

A potential only in class breakthrough on the horizon for Valneva this year is our highly anticipated Lyme disease vaccine candidate, VLA15. Pivotal Phase 3 data for VLA15 are expected in H1 2026, and the outcome will have a transformational impact on the organization. I want us as a company to harness such pivotal moments and view them through a lens of future strategic opportunity – considering how we can rapidly increase scale and capitalize on momentum to augment our value proposition.

Alongside this excitement, it’s also important that we don’t neglect our portfolio outside of Lyme disease and continue to get the fundamentals right in 2026. We need to maintain our existing travel vaccination offering, deliver on our financial projections and advance other programs in a diligent way – this includes adhering to the necessary compliance standards, ensuring optimal supply and planning effectively to meet demand.

The continued importance of strategic partnerships

As in previous years, partnerships were a cornerstone of value creation for our organization in 2025, and they look set to continue delivering meaningful impact in 2026. Our partnership with Pfizer on VLA15 is of major importance to the company and sets a benchmark for the industry. During my career, I’ve enjoyed working on both sides of the small biotech / Big Pharma divide and I truly admire the collaboration we have built, based on mutual trust and shared commitment. Other very important partnerships include The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) or Instituto Butantan. These partnerships highlight how resilient, well-aligned collaborations are critical, not only when progress is smooth, but even more so when navigating complexity and uncertainty.

How vaccine companies can deliver global impact in 2026 and beyond

When I began my career there were at least a dozen specialist vaccine companies in existence, however in the years since, a huge consolidation has meant that the vast majority of global vaccine revenue now sits in four to five Big Pharma companies. For those of us that remain solely dedicated to the vaccine space, our value lies in also developing specialized solutions that possibly fall outside the scale expectations of large pharma companies. For example does Valneva’s commercial infrastructure allow us to also pursue niche vaccine targets – opportunities for which we may not be able to otherwise find a large, global commercial partner. We are also committed to protecting more people by expanding global access to vaccines through local partnerships, which bigger companies are typically less able or willing to do.

Embracing the year ahead with confident leadership

With the new year now underway, I find I have a renewed motivation to embrace the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead. After over 35 years spent in vaccines, I feel a deep-rooted commitment to keep pushing for progress – particularly at a time when some preventable diseases are re-emerging– and a hence a necessity to foster the importance of evidence-based decision making on vaccination.

Reflecting on 2025, the central leadership principle that will remain with me for 2026 is resilience and positive attitude for change. Especially in times of transformation I find it is essential to offer clear and confident leadership that sets the tone for others – creating reassurance and ensuring focus across the organization. Last year showed me that challenge can accelerate development, strengthen dedication and foster creative thinking. Building that confidence in our people will remain vital as we seek to maximize the opportunities of 2026.

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