MedMira Receives Order of Half a Million HIV tests from Vitest
Company Now a Registered Supplier for the United Nations Population Fund (UNPFA)
Halifax, Nova Scotia, December 21, 2009 – MedMira Inc., (“MedMira”) (TSX Venture: MIR, NASDAQ: MMIRF), a developer and marketer of rapid diagnostic technology and solutions, today announced that its strategic sales and marketing partner, Vitest AG (Vitest), has placed an order for 510,000 rapid HIV tests to fulfill the initial sales in Africa. Vitest has been working in the region for the past several months, developing market opportunities for MedMira’s rapid HIV tests.
Building on the Company’s increasing focus on Africa and other developing regions along with the need to further develop relationships with international organizations, MedMira has also received notification from the United Nation Global Marketplace (UNGM) that its application to become a registered supplier for the United Nation Population Fund (UNPFA) has been accepted. MedMira and its strategic partner Vitest are now able to participate in the many UNPFA procurement opportunities.
“Our strategic partnership plan has reached its first major milestone. The combination of manufacturing services and sales partnerships has empowered our ability to increase our revenue expectation for the coming year,” said Hermes Chan, CEO, MedMira Inc. “We’re also very excited to become a registered supplier for the UNPFA and we are pursuing additional registrations from various organizations within the United Nation Global Marketplace in order to broaden our opportunities within the international development sector.”
Chan continued, “Over the course of the past week we had the opportunity to work in person with Vitest, when their team visited our Halifax headquarters. Our teams collaborated to further strengthen our strategic market development plan and increase our focus on fulfilling the demand for quality diagnostics in Africa and other developing regions.”
This order is a direct result of Vitest’s focused efforts to establish the MedMira product as a quality alternative to the current status quo in Africa. Vitest and MedMira’s increasingly efficient partnership has led to very positive progress to date.
“This order in excess of half a million tests will further enhance the demand for MedMira’s quality tests around the world. The recent public acknowledgement of the HIV epidemic in South Africa by President Jacob Zuma, is a huge milestone in the fight against HIV within this country, and the timely commitment of US$2.7 billion pledged by President Obama to help fight HIV infection in Kenya, have reinforced the public need for quality rapid tests. Our market development in Africa is progressing rapidly and we will look to further expand our presence and the awareness of our products with governments, international development agencies, and other NGOs working in the region,” said Nicholas Dellaportas, Director of International Business Development and Sales, Vitest AG. “To date end-user feedback on the MedMira product has been very encouraging and we believe that the African market has matured to a point where quality, speed, and ease-of-use, all key features of the MedMira test, are of the utmost importance and will be a huge advantage to all health care providers within the continent.”
