Genesis Pharma S.A.

When a Greek company shows an 80% sales increase constantly for the last four years is, beyond doubt, an important business issue. But when this company comes from the biotechnology area, this is an issue to be investigated.

And this is because biotechnology and especially pharmaceutical biotechnology is a totally new business area in Greece, much promising and developing. It's worth mentioning that, in the near future according to estimations, 50% of therapies will be based on biotechnology medicines.

GENESIS Pharma S.A. one of the fastest growing Greek pharmaceutical companies - which first exploited the advantages of biotechnology, creating a whole new market - has conquered a leading position in pharmaceutical biotechnology, not only in Greece but in Southeast Europe as well. Furthermore, GENESIS Pharma is the only Greek member of the Emerging Biotechnology Enterprises (EBE) of European Biotech Organisation, member of the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations (EFPIA).
Also, GENESIS Pharma was awarded as the 5th Best Place to Work in Greece in the "Best Workplaces 2005" competition.
"K" magazine met Mr. Costas Evripides, GENESIS Pharma CEO, who talked to us about the progress of the company, its extroversion, its business plans for the next 5 years, its share listing in the A.S.E, its in-licensing agreements and the first years' difficulties. "We started as if we were a large company, not as a small one" stated Mr. Evripides and this maybe the key to the company's success. Mr. Evripides also commented on medicinal issues, the medicinal products list as well as the business environment in general, emphasizing that what businessmen request from politicians is a steady, friendly environment, without surprises, in order for them to be creative.

Q: Mr. Evripides, how would you explain such a high sales' increase (80%) since 2001 that led GENESIS Pharma at the top of pharmaceutical biotechnology?

GENESIS' Pharma constant sales' increase during the last four years reflects the company's rapid development and is due to a series of factors that formed the company's operations since its establishment, in 1997.
At the beginning, GENESIS' Pharma establishment was based on the concept of a progressive business initiative; that is to exploit the opportunities given by the pharmaceutical biotechnology sector internationally. GENESIS Pharma was the first merely Greek company to activate in this growing and much promising market and managed to win its customers' trust.
Also, from the first year of operation, GENESIS Pharma accomplished strategic alliances with top U.S. and European biopharmaceutical companies: Amgen, Biogen Idec, Chiron, Cephalon, Shire etc. At the same time, while developing its existing products portfolio, the company is actively evaluating the opportunities for new partnerships. The company operates with extroversion, investing in new promising markets, emphasizing in South East Europe. Its Head Office is in Athens, but is intensively active in Cyprus, Bulgaria, and Romania, has expanded into the markets of Slovenia and Croatia and is now entering the market of F.Y.R.O.M.
Finally, GENESIS' Pharma highly skilled personnel, with vision and faith to the principles of honesty and integrity, have essentially contributed to this remarkable upswing you mentioned before.

Q: GENESIS Pharma is one of the fastest growing Greek pharmaceutical biotechnology companies. We would literally say, you are one of the companies that started the "magic" trip of biotechnology in our country. What is the future of biotechnology and what could the Greek patient and each individual in general expect from this evolution?

As I mentioned before, GENESIS Pharma first exploited the opportunities offered by biotechnology sector internationally, by recognizing its significant contribution to mankind.
Today, pharmaceutical biotechnology exploits the constructional material of the human body - cells, genes, proteins, enzymes and anti-bodies - for the treatment of medical conditions that could not be effectively treated in the past.
This constructional material has an ad-hoc action, thus its products have less side effects and are more accurate to the treatment of diseases. Additionally, it allows us, in some cases, to predict and prevent the disease instead of just react in its symptoms. More specifically, biotechnology is a valuable tool in the therapeutic areas of Hematology, Nephrology, Oncology, Rheumatology etc.
Thus I would say we could expect pleasant surprises in the above mentioned areas as well as in self-immunes.
Biotechnology's contribution to patients has already been very important: over 250 million people have already been helped from more than 130 biotechnology medicines and re-combinant vaccines, while more than 370 biotechnology medicines are in clinical trials, for 200 different diseases, such as various types of cancer, heart diseases, Multiple Sclerosis, AIDS. Of course research is continual, and that gives us the hope that future results will be even more impressive. In the near future according to estimations, 50% of the diseases will be treated through biotechnology medicines.
As for Greece, the proper environment for the wide development of the biotechnology sector has not yet been created. The governmental and private investments in biotechnology research are low, in contrast with other European countries such as Germany, Great Britain, France, Sweden, which present significant research activity and high value investments. Also, high specs scientific resources remain unexploited, while vision and strategic planning for the development of pharmaceutical biotechnology are absent. Within this environment, initiatives like GENESIS' Pharma are very important and give hope to many patients in our country.

Q: Pharmaceutical sector is particularly competitive, both internationally and in our country. How do you feel about competition and how would you envisage the future of the pharmaceutical companies during the coming years? Additionally, as you are already aware, production in Greece has almost been ceased and most of the pharmaceutical companies have turned in trading, while pricing policy is clearly punishing Greek enterprises. What is your opinion about that and how could this negative frame been reversed?

First of all I would like to note that companies need a stable and friendly environment, without surprises, in order to be creative. And this is something politicians must have in mind.
I believe that medicines offer much more than each patient pay for them. At the same time, I would say that imported medicines must be equally priced with home produced medicines, as pricing policy applied today clearly favors imports. The fact that pharmaceutical manufacturing in Greece is almost ceased is not the most important issue. I believe that production will add value and gain a competitive advantage in Greece, only if our country becomes the Balkans business centre. This will be accomplished by companies if they export, if they produce other companies' private label products and if they act as agents of large foreign enterprises for the Balkans area.
As far as the reimbursed medicinal products list is concerned we absolutely agree with its abolition; however a control environment should exist.

Q: In the "Best Workplaces Awards 2005" Competition, GENESIS Pharma was awarded as the 5th Best Place to Work. What does such an award mean for a company and what are the liabilities induced by it?

It is the third consecutive time that GENESIS Pharma is awarded as one of the 10 Best Places to Work in the «Best Workplaces» competition. We ranked 8th in 2003, 7th in 2004 and this year we were voted as 5th. It is worth mentioning that GENESIS Pharma is one of the very few Greek companies, solely under Greek ownership, that participated in the competition.
This award fills us first of all with moral satisfaction, and supports the policy, the standards and principles we have followed to this day. In GENESIS Pharma, human factor has always been our first priority in every activity. From the first moment, we gave our employees a high attention, acknowledging their contribution to our success. For this reason, we make sure to provide a pleasant and friendly working environment and offer equal opportunities to all those contributing to the company's growth as well as high level of wages and benefits.
By having consistently invested to the human factor all these years, we attained not only a great performance but a high reputation in the market as well, which ranks us among the exemplary Greek employers. At the same time, we feel it's our responsibility to be up to grade and constantly improve our practices, as expectations are really high. However this couldn't stress us, since our practices followed are deliberate and not occasional.

The strategic goal of GENESIS Pharma is to continuously develop its existing partnerships with the top U.S. and European companies of cellular and molecular technology: Amgen, Biogen Idec, Chiron, Cephalon, Shire etc. At the same time, we methodically identify and evaluate any new opportunities. This way we ensure our outstanding market performance and succeed in establishing GENESIS Pharma in Southeast Europe.

The company's strategic plan for the next five years includes:

The main difficulty was to initially gain the companies' trust and make them come to us, since the industry of health isn't the easiest one. It is however important that we started as if we were a large company, not as a small one.

Q: Mr. Evripides, you are leading an important Greek pharmaceutical company. At the same time though, you possess a long managerial experience in international companies. Thus I would like to ask you, how do you see the Greek business environment today, what pleases you and what hurts you?

Two are the dominant elements of the current business environment in Greece. On the one hand is the absence of competitiveness that causes an intense perturbation about the companies' growth potentials, while, on the other hand, opportunities that rose in the meta-Olympics period create hope for development and progress.
Our country is ranked low as concerned to the competitiveness of entrepreneurship, related to USA and Japan, as well as the rest of Europe. It seems that, especially after the completion of the Olympics, we are stuck in an awkward hold-on position, which we have to overcome so that companies move forward in a competitive way.
There is no doubt that Greek market has to get over high barriers against more mature markets. The public sector's low efficiency, the inflexible legislative line, public debt, education being distant from the society of knowledge and global economy, the delay in new technologies' diffusion, the low rate of investments in research and development, the companies' introversion and the high level of unemployment are indicative factors that head off new investments and effective business tactics.
On the other hand, the Olympic Games not only gave us a great chance to promote our country, but also legated us with high specs infrastructure, which will be supported by the Community Structural Funds. Also, Greek businesses maintain a great advantage related to other European countries: their geographic and cultural neighboring on the Southeast European countries opens them the path for investing in these promising markets. All the above support business initiatives and offer great opportunities.
Within this environment, we in GENESIS Pharma appeared to be flexible and innovative. We started as a small team with vision and strategic plan, conceptualized the Greek market and served our customers' needs by offering high quality products, developing strategic cooperation with international companies, exploiting new technologies, respecting while investing in human factor and developing a set of values and principles emphasizing in innovation, transparency and integrity. This way we managed to be established in Greek market.
However we did not stay there. We developed an extroversive strategy and invested in the growing markets of Southeast Europe within a short period. All the above made us a competitive strength not only in Greece but in Balkans as well.
Thus, it is important for Greek companies to recognize the difficulties and identify the opportunities appearing in the business environment they operate. I think they can succeed if they move dynamically with flexibility and creativity.