Egypt Resilient and Open: Healthy Options
With 50 years’ experience and regional leadership in the pharmaceutical industry,
MINAPHARM is constantly striving to provide innovative quality medicines and services
to patients in developing countries, so that they too can benefit from the latest
advances in pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical research technologies. To achieve
its mission and strategic goals, MINAPHARM exploits a robust research and development
platform combined with strategic multi-alliances, involving industry players at
the forefront of the latest pharmaceutical technologies, marketing and management
techniques. This has further enabled the establishment of specialised lines, embracing
innovative and affordable products and services in the fields of gastroenterology, cardiology,
ophthalmology, orthopaedics, and uro-gynaecology.
Dr Wafik Bardissi, MINAPHARM’s chairman, explains how he is trying to strike
a balance between innovative and affordable medicines with the help of the multinationals.
“Most of the players are multinational companies who choose certain
products of interest to launch in relation to market needs. This is primarily driven
by the demands of 90 million people. We have the consolidation of the history
of the industry of
pharmaceutical production, and the know-how. If you put that
together with “the benefit of a large demand from the population and all the geopolitical
demographic issues, as well as what is already available and the consolidated
knowhow we already have, we have a platform that can go into Africa and the rest
of the world. Our business model is also looking into Europe.”
“Our wholly owned Berlin-based German subsidiary, ProBioGen AG, is a renowned
Contract Development and Manufacturing Organisation (CDMO) and technology
provider. ProBioGen AG has extensive expertise in cell line engineering,
process development (upstream and downstream processes) and GMP. Innovative
scientific excellence, coupled with a strong intellectual property base, allows
ProBioGen AG to cover the entire drug development value chain, including regulatory
support for IND-filing. All services and technologies are embedded within
a total quality management system, to assure compliance with international ISO
and GMP standards (EMA/FDA). At the Cairo-based Rhein-Minapharm, a group
of young talented Egyptian scientists represents the first research community in
the Middle East region to develop new processes for the production of genetically
engineered drugs”.
MINAPHARM ranks among the leading pharmaceutical companies in Egypt and
the Middle East, maintaining one of the broadest quality-products portfolio within
the industry. Its longstanding expertise covers a broad spectrum of medicines, ranging
from small molecules to extremely complex bioengineered proteins. We are
leading a transition towards high-value biologicals in our developing markets, while
expanding a robust small-molecule setup in a business model that is a far departure
from existing regional models. In addition to production of life-saving and life-enhancing
medicines, MINAPHARM is adopting an international operation platform
for biotechnology and cellular engineering. Novel scientific solutions and technologies
contribute to the development of products that were unimaginable a decade
ago. Scientific excellence and expertise in cellular and bioprocess engineering enable
our mission to provide not only developed markets, but also emerging markets with
significant economic molecules, thus crossing the next frontier. “We have had lots
of interaction in the outsourcing of research projects in the UK and Scotland but
not in terms of real partnership with medium-sized companies. Partnerships with
multinational companies are usually project based, but partnership does not really
benefit local players. Still, we have that opportunity, and we look forward to seeing
that part of the industry in the UK, the middle-sized companies showing an interest
in coming to Egypt, where we would give them a warm welcome.”