Avacta (LON:AVCT) shares spiked higher on Friday after the group announced a collaboration with US-based Adeptrix to develop an antigen COVID-19 test.

The tests will utilise Avacta’s Affimer® biotherapeutics and help to significantly increase the number of tests clinicians are able to conduct in hospitals. With the WHO and governments around the world emphasising the importance of testing, the demand for the tests will be substantial.

Tests using technology such as Avacta’s Affimer® antigen technology will be crucial to tracking the spread of coronavirus and help reopen global economies.

Avacta shares entered an auction after the open on Friday morning as shares spiked on the announcement. The Avacta share price was up in excess of 12% when shares eventually began trading.

Shares in Avacta have now increased more than 400% in April alone.

Avacta’s Affimer® technology targets uses SARS-COV-2 spike proteins to target virus particles in tests such as swabs and saliva samples.

There were no commercial details released, but it was confirmed Avacta will earn a royalty from Adeptrix.

Dr Alastair Smith, Chief Executive Officer of Avacta Group, commented:

“We are delighted to have established this partnership with Adeptrix in our push to develop Affimer -based COVID-19 antigen tests. Jeff and his team are world-renowned in the mass spectrometry field, and the BAMS diagnostic platform is highly sensitive and specific, giving us great confidence that a high performance COVID-19 antigen test can be developed and launched commercially very quickly.”

“We believe that the BAMS test will be hugely attractive as an adjunct to PCR testing because it uses laboratory equipment that is already in hospital labs but not currently used for COVID-19 testing so it provides incremental testing capacity.”

“A consensus view is building around the world that hundreds of millions of COVID-19 tests are going to be required per month for a long period, and that the disease will be endemic after the initial pandemic has passed, meaning that testing for COVID-19 is going to be needed for many years.”

“I have made it clear that we intend to partner the SARS-COV-2 spike protein Affimer reagents with several select companies to support antigen test development on multiple diagnostic test platforms. This will contribute most effectively to the urgent need to increase antigen testing capacity globally and maximise the commercial return to Avacta. Adeptrix is one example of this and other discussions are underway. I look forward very much to further updating the market in the near future.”