Official position of CineVo Ukraine on the seizure of the laboratory building at the request of the State Bureau of Investigation

The European network of medical laboratories Cinévo Ukraine, which is part of the international Medicover group headquartered in Stockholm (Sweden), officially declares that the arrest imposed on the building of the company's headquarters and central laboratory located at Kyiv, 46/2 Akademika Palladina Ave. (bldg. 3), by the Lychakiv District Court of Lviv at the request of the State Bureau of Investigation (SBI) is unlawful, illegal, and may be considered as pressure on the business, which is the largest European investment in the healthcare sector of Ukraine.

The criminal proceedings under which the SBI seized the building are being conducted on the basis of the alleged illegal withdrawal of real estate from state ownership between 2016 and 2021. At the same time, the above-mentioned criminal proceedings of the SBI have nothing to do with the Medicover International Group or the building owned by the group and seized. After all, the international Medicover group, represented by its member, the Cyprus-based company Linkmix Holdings Limited, purchased the building back in 2010 from individuals.

That is, at the time of the acquisition of the building in 2010, it was privately owned and not owned by the state, and accordingly, the building could not have been withdrawn from state ownership in 2016-2021.

Moreover, in the period from 2013 to 2016, the international group Medicover, as the legal owner of the building, reconstructed the building to improve its characteristics for conducting business in providing quality laboratory services to Ukrainians. During the reconstruction, the building's area was more than tripled. And according to Ukrainian legislation, after such reconstruction, the building is considered to be a newly created object by its owner. The above, in turn, further proves the illegality of the seizure imposed by the SBI.

In addition, the building was seized by the SBI without official notification of CineVo Ukraine and the owner of the building, the Cyprus-based company Linkmix Holdings Limited, and without summoning the companies' representatives to the relevant court hearing. As a result, CineVo Ukraine became aware of the arrest only after the relevant entry appeared in the state register.

Given the above, CineVo insists that the seizure by the SBI of a building that is in no way related to the circumstances under investigation in the relevant criminal proceedings of the SBI, a building that cannot be used as material evidence in such criminal proceedings, is legally illegal. The respective criminal proceedings of the SBI were used solely as a far-fetched and unreasonable pretext for the seizure. Thus, the arrest is a direct manifestation of pressure on the international Medicover group and Cinevo Ukraine laboratory.

Additional evidence of such pressure from the SBI is that the seizure of the building provides, in addition to the standard prohibitions on the alienation of property, also prohibits the owner of the building from using the building in any way, including by leasing the building (or part of it) to other persons. This is not only a non-standard prohibition for this type of arrest, but also an action aimed at blocking the work of the medical laboratory Cinevo Ukraine, which solely uses the building as its key center for administrative work and medical laboratory diagnostics services.

CineVo Ukraine calls on the State Bureau of Investigation and the authorities to resolve the issue as soon as possible in the legal field and to cancel the illegal seizure of the laboratory building.

If the issue is not resolved immediately, Cinevo Laboratory will be forced to cease its activities in the building, which will lead to a complete shutdown of Cinevo Ukraine.

As a result, not only millions of Ukrainian citizens, Cinevo's customers, but also many charitable, non-profit, military, and government organizations that the company serves free of charge, such as the soldiers of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, patients of the Amosov National Institute of Cardiovascular Surgery, will be left without modern laboratory diagnostics services.M. Amosov National Institute of Cardiovascular Surgery, patients of the Supehumans Center for Prosthetics, Reconstructive Surgery, and Rehabilitation of War Victims, and citizens who are provided with free medical care under the NHSU Medical Guarantee Program. In total, about 250-300 thousand people per month.

The result will also be a loss of more than UAH 310 million in taxes and fees annually to the budget of the warring country, as this is the amount Cinevo laboratories in Ukraine paid in 2023 alone, and more than 2,300 employees will become unemployed.

Cinévo Ukraine emphasizes that it has always operated exclusively within the framework of Ukrainian legislation and is the only private healthcare company in Ukraine that was listed (as part of the Medicover Group) on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange in Stockholm and was the first among Ukrainian healthcare companies to participate in an IPO, which demonstrates high standards and business culture. The arrest of the company's building by the State Bureau of Investigation is completely unjustified, illegal, and jeopardizes the activities of Cinevo Ukraine. Such unlawful actions of Ukrainian government agencies significantly worsen the investment climate in the country and cause irreparable damage to Ukraine's image in the international arena, especially during the war.

About Synevo Ukraine:

Synevo Ukraine, the European network of medical laboratories, is the largest network in Ukraine with 340 laboratory offices, 8 laboratories (in Kyiv, Lviv, Chernivtsi, Vinnytsia, Odesa, Kherson, Dnipro, and Kharkiv), and more than 2300 employees in 139 locations across the country. Launched in 2007 in Kyiv, today the network of medical laboratories Cinevo Ukraine is capable of performing more than 800 types of tests and annually serves about 4 million clients, performing more than 20 million tests.

Cinevo Ukraine is part of Medicover, a leading international healthcare and diagnostic services company. The international laboratory network Synevo is represented in 10 European countries, and Synevo laboratories operate in Germany, Poland, Romania, Turkey, Georgia, Moldova, Bulgaria, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina. In 2017, Cinévo Ukraine, as part of Medicover, was listed on the Nasdaq Stockholm, becoming the first and only healthcare company in Ukraine to participate in an IPO.

For more information, please visit synevo.ua

About Medicover:

Medicover is a leading international healthcare and diagnostic services company founded in 1995. Today, Medicover operates a large number of outpatient clinics, hospitals, specialized facilities, laboratories, and blood collection points, and the company's largest markets are Poland, Germany, Romania, and India. In 2022, Medicover's revenue amounted to more than EUR 1.5 billion, and the company employed more than 44,000 people.

For more information, visit medicover.com