AQUILON CYL SOCIEDAD LIMITADA

Their core work

Aquilon CYL is a Spanish biotech SME specializing in veterinary vaccine development, specifically targeting Bovine Viral Diarrhea virus (BVDv) — one of the most economically damaging cattle diseases in Europe. Their core technology is a Virus-Like Particle (VLP) platform engineered to carry multiple antigens simultaneously, enabling what is known as a polyantigenic vaccine. Their lead product is a DIVA-compatible (Differentiation of Infected from Vaccinated Animals) vaccine, which allows farmers and veterinarians to distinguish vaccinated animals from genuinely infected ones — a critical regulatory and biosecurity feature. They progressed from proof-of-concept to full-scale development within the EU SME Instrument, indicating they are a development-stage company with a single high-conviction product platform.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

Aquilon CYL's H2020 trajectory follows a single, focused product development arc rather than a broadening of research interests. In 2017, they completed an SME Phase 1 feasibility study (€50,000) to validate the VLP-based BVDv vaccine concept. By 2019, they had secured a full SME Phase 2 development grant (€1.55M) to advance the same vaccine toward prototype and market validation. There is no detectable shift in topic — this is a company that identified one problem, one technology, and one market, and pursued it with concentration through the entire period.

Aquilon CYL is on a linear commercialization path for a single veterinary vaccine product — any future collaboration would most likely involve licensing, clinical validation, regulatory support, or scale-up manufacturing for the BVDv VLP vaccine.

How they like to work

Aquilon CYL has acted as sole coordinator in both H2020 projects, with no recorded consortium partners in the CORDIS data — consistent with the SME Instrument model, which is designed for single-company or very small-team applications. This suggests they work independently or with subcontractors rather than in broad research consortia. For potential partners, this means they are likely to engage as a technology owner seeking specific service providers (CROs, CMOs, regulatory consultants) rather than as a collaborative research partner sharing IP development.

No formal consortium partners are recorded across either H2020 project, which is typical of the SME Instrument. Their collaboration footprint is effectively limited to León, Spain, with no documented international research partnerships in this dataset.

What sets them apart

Aquilon CYL occupies a narrow but defensible niche: they are developing what appears to be a proprietary DIVA-compatible, VLP-based polyantigenic vaccine against BVDv — a disease that costs the European cattle industry an estimated €900M annually. The combination of DIVA compatibility and VLP platform in a single veterinary product is technically differentiated from conventional modified-live and inactivated BVDv vaccines currently on the market. Their value to a potential partner lies in the product asset itself and the EU-funded development data package backing it, not in broad research capacity.

Highlights from their portfolio

• BoVLP-BVD (SME-1)
  The Phase 1 feasibility study that unlocked the Phase 2 grant, demonstrating that the concept passed independent EU expert review.
• BoVLP-BVD (SME-2)
  The largest single investment in their portfolio at €1.55M, representing a full EU-funded product development program for a novel BVDv vaccine — the core asset of this company.