ALT vs MRK

Altimmune Inc.

Altimmune, Inc., a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company, focuses on developing intranasal vaccines, immune modulating therapies, and treatments for liver disease. The company develops AdCOVID, a single-dose intranasal vaccine that is in Phase I clinical trial to protect against COVID-19; T-COVID, an intranasal immune modulating therapeutic candidate, which is in Phase I/II clinical trial to evaluate the potential of T-COVID to prevent clinical worsening in patients with early COVID-19; NasoShield, an anthrax vaccine product candidate that is in a Phase 1b trial; and NasoVAX, a recombinant intranasal vaccine product candidate, which completed Phase IIa clinical trial for the treatment of seasonal and pandemic use. It also focuses on developing ALT-801, a novel peptide-based dual GLP-1/glucagon receptor agonist for the treatment of non-alcoholic steatohepatitis that is in Phase I clinical trial; and HepTcell, an immunotherapeutic product candidate, which is in Phase II clinical trial for patients chronically infected with the hepatitis B virus. Altimmune, Inc. has a collaboration with the University of Alabama at Birmingham for the development of AdCOVID. The company is headquartered in Gaithersburg, Maryland.

Merck & Company Inc.

Merck & Co., Inc. operates as a healthcare company worldwide. It operates through two segments, Pharmaceutical and Animal Health segments. The Pharmaceutical segment offers human health pharmaceutical products in the areas of oncology, hospital acute care, immunology, neuroscience, virology, cardiovascular, diabetes, and women's health, as well as vaccine products. The Animal Health segment provides discovers, develops, manufactures, and markets a range of veterinary pharmaceuticals, vaccines, and health management solutions and services, as well as a suite of digitally connected identification, traceability, and monitoring products. The company has collaborations with AstraZeneca PLC; Bayer AG; Eisai Co., Ltd.; and Ridgeback Biotherapeutics. It serves drug wholesalers and retailers, hospitals, and government agencies; managed health care providers, such as health maintenance organizations, pharmacy benefit managers, and other institutions; and physicians and physician distributors, veterinarians, and animal producers. The company has collaboration agreement with Gilead Sciences, Inc. to co-develop and co-commercialize long-acting investigational treatment combinations of Lenacapavir and Islatravir in HIV; Amathus Therapeutics to develop treatments for neurodegenerative diseases; and Linnaeus Therapeutics, Inc. to evaluate LNS8801 in combination with KEYTRUDA for patients with advanced cancer. It also has a collaboration with Biomed X Gmbh for building on ongoing research projects in the fields of oncology (DNA damage response and RNA splicing) and autoimmunity (intestinal epithelial barrier in autoimmune diseases); and a collaboration agreement with NGM Biopharmaceuticals, Inc. to focus primarily on the development of novel medicines for unmet patient needs in retinal and CVM diseases, including heart failure. Merck & Co., Inc. was founded in 1891 and is headquartered in Kenilworth, New Jersey.