Co-founder of Nanolek Vladimir Khristenko announced his intention to step down as President, the post he has been holding since 2015. Mr. Khristenko transferred the corporate governance of the pharmaceutical company, supplier of 25% of vaccines for the National vaccination schedule of Russia, completely to his partner Mikhail Nekrasov, General Director of Nanolek. The shareholding structure of the company will remain unchanged.

Vladimir Khristenko said:

I believe my mission has been accomplished: our company has gone a long way from a pure startup business to one of the backbone Russian biopharmaceutical companies. On average, 12 years is a long period of time for any Russian business, however for a pharma industry this is a very small time span. We have developed ahead of schedule, at a record pace.

And quotes the figures: the company’s revenue grew from RUB 300 million in 2015 to almost RUB 20 billion 2021. In 2020, the company saw a revenue growth of 70% compared to 2019, and in 2021 — a revenue increase of + 57% versus 2020.

Vladimir Khristenko emphasized:

Now it’s time for Nanolek to switch to the next level that requires a different management approach, not the one I pursue. I’m clearly a startup guy. I love to create something from scratch, something exposed to maximum risks, however with maximum thrill, and this is exactly my element. In recent years, I have tried to invest in a targeted way in other people’s endeavours and undertakings. This is also rather interesting, but I’m perfectly aware that this is not enough for me. So, I will take a breath, reflect on what has been done and achieved so far and will in any case invent something new.

As one of the co-founder of Nanolek, Mr. Mikhail Nekrasov will remain General Director of the company. Mr. Nekrasov, one of the pioneers of the new Russian pharma industry, a physician by his degree and a successful businessman in the field of biotechnologies, will continue the company’s path of business development: now we are witnessing a lot of new growth opportunities that arise within the context of vigorous import substitution measures to be implemented at present time. During the time of its work, Nanolek has gathered a highly competitive expertise to cope with this task, while cooperating with the leading global experts in localization projects.

Mikhail Nekrasov emphasized:

Our main task for the next few years is to develop strategic partnerships with large players in the Russian market. Our nation sets ambitious goals to be met by the entire pharma industry: make sure that people in Russia have access to all necessary medicines and drugs used for disease prevention, and in this respect, import substitution is nowadays a top priority. However, there are also no less important things to do: we need to drive forward promising endeavours in order to create our own innovative drugs. Nonetheless, none of this could be possible without a close cooperation between the leading pharmaceutical companies: we need to go side by side and should learn to pool resources wisely.