Grindex not planning to buy Olianfarm

  • 2005-10-05
  • From wire reports
RIGA - Latvia's largest pharmaceutical plant, Grindex, said it had no plans to purchase Olainfarm, the country's second largest plant. Janis Naglis, Grindex council member and minority shareholder, told the Russian language Deloviye Vesti business newspaper that the company was not planning to acquire Olainfarm.


"I think it is also not on the schedule of Valerijs Maligins," he said, referring to Olainfarm board chairman and the biggest shareholder.

"Grindex and Olainfarm are different enterprises… and they have different philosophies. At least for now, Olainfarm has been working in the style of crisis management to recover from debts and avoid bankruptcy, while Grindex has been able to look around and develop," Naglis explained.

He also noted that Grindex, which has been busy expanding its operations in recent months, is gradually transforming into a concern. It bought a pharmaceutical plant in Tallinn and is cooperating more closely with other companies.

Naglis said Grindex was currently eyeing a 47 percent stake in Jelfa a medicine producer in Poland, as well as East European companies in Romania, Slovakia and other states, where the privatization process is underway and it is possible to acquire businesses.

"The most important thing is that such a deal would allow to cut production costs - this is the whole point. But only time will show what we buy. I can say only that presently we are working on investment projects both in Riga and outside Latvia," Naglis told the paper.

Grindex's largest shareholder is Kirovs Lipmans with a 27.38 percent stake, followed by Anna Lipmane (20.69 percent) and former Aldaris chief Vitalijs Gavrilovs (14 percent). The key shareholder of Olainfarm is Maligins' Olainfarm company, which owns 49 percent of the pharmaceutical producer's shares, while a 26 percent stake in owned by Juris Savickis, the head of Itera Latvija company.