New tender for Galenika in April 2017 – State announces different privatization model

A new tender for the privatization of the Belgrade-based pharmaceutical company Galenika will be called in a month and a half, the state secretary at the Ministry of Economy of Serbia, Milun Trivunac, announced on March 3.

He said to the press that a new model of privatization would probably be chosen.

– An agreement with banks, creditors of Galenika, has been reached on them not collecting their claims during the privatization process – Trivunac said.

The previous attempt at a sale of a share in Galenika was unsuccessful, as the sole interested investor failed to reach an agreement with the banks with claims of around EUR 70 million from the company.

Negotiations were held starting with early February with the British-Russian consortium Frontier-Petrovax. The consortium asked for a minimum price of EUR 7 million for 25% of the ownership and was prepared to keep 700 of Galenika's 1,400 workers.

Minister of Economy Goran Knezevic said that the state would not give up on Galenika, considering its potential, which could develop through other models of privatization in order for Galenika to once again start operating in a sustainable and profitable manner.

The Government of Serbia previously reached a conclusion recommending to the supervisory bodies of state creditors not to issue orders for freezing the account and not to carry out the procedure of collecting their claims, as well as to withdraw securities on receivables from Galenika and its subsidiaries until a final agreement with commercial creditors is reached and no later than March 31.

Galenika a.d. Beograd

Ministarstvo privrede Republike Srbije

sale of Galenika

privatization of Galenika

Milan Trivunac

Frontier

Petrovax

Goran Knezevic