The New Brunswick, N.J., pharmaceutical company in recent months terminated manufacturing agreements with companies that helped produce the shot during the pandemic such as Catalent Inc. and Sanofi SA. 

Meanwhile, a partnership with rival Merck & Co. to help make the shots, forged at the urging of the U.S. government, hasn’t lived up to expectations. The companies are now engaged in arbitration. 

Merck, of Rahway, N.J., has produced J&J vaccines at only one of its plants, while it didn’t make commercial doses at another plant that involved a more complex part of the manufacturing process, according to people familiar with the matter. 

“They were trying to do this the best way possible to meet global demand but all of those plans fell apart,” said Prashant Yadav, a supply-chain expert and senior fellow at the Center for Global Development, a think tank focused on cutting poverty.

J&J said it is making its Covid-19 vaccine available where needed, and it has hundreds of millions of doses available. It didn’t comment on whether it will continue to produce it. 

J&J Slashes Production of its Unpopular COVID-19 Shot – WSJ