Any BioTech Guys that Have Looked at Moderna?

I am not a biotech person, looking at Moderna. Has any looked at Moderna as a possible long or short? Why was it USED for such an IMPORTANT pandemic? Specifically trying to get comfortable with the following qs: 

1. Which of their drugs in-development are first-in-class drugs? What is generally the decision-framework behind allocating capital to these? 

2. How does one think through their scientist research and your scientist-retention ratio? What is the best way to measure productivity? Is it increase (%) in R&D relative to the % # of drugs that pass onto the next phase?    

3. I am looking at their teams' cost-base in relation to Pfitzer (much larger company, granted), and using your SG&A expense as a proxy for fixed costs including non R&D salaries, I see the average cost / employee is $110K compared to $73K for Pfitzer. I understand earlier years may be spent burning cash, but Moderna has been around for 10+ years now. How do I justify these to myself? 

4. Related to the above note, for the senior management, how is the payout determined? What factor does R&D pipeline achievement play in that?     

5. With respect to its revenue split, how should one think about it from Government Contracts, and Grant perspective, and which r assets have licensing potential i.e. ability to earn royalties? 

6. Their revenue for 9M 21 was about $11.3 billion, of which 75% is in deferred revenue. What would be the cost of servicing this revenue? Is it non-material?

7. I am not a fan of DCFs, particularly over a long time frame. It's like coming up with something out of your ass when you have no idea what will transpire over the future. What's a better valuation metric to value biotech?

8. For those of you with non science backgrounds, how did you get comfortable "understanding the science"?

Let me know pls. thx