The State Bureau of Investigation (SBI) seized the building of the main office and central laboratory of the “Sinevo Ukraine”.
This is reported by Forbes with reference to the companyʼs statement.
"Sinevo" warns that it will soon be forced to stop operating in this building. This will cause a complete shutdown of the network of laboratories in Ukraine.
The arrest of the building of the head office and central laboratory of the "Sinevo Ukraine" in Kyiv at 46/2 Akademika Palladina Avenue was imposed by the Lychakivsky district court of the city of Lviv at the request of SBI, the company reports. “Sinevo” called it pressure on business.
SBI opened criminal proceedings against the network of laboratories due to the fact that between 2016 and 2021, “Sinevo” allegedly illegally appropriated a building that belonged to the state.
The company claims to have purchased the building in 2010, when it was privately owned. Moreover, in the period from 2013 to 2016, the company carried out its reconstruction, increasing the area of the building by more than three times.
"According to the legislation of Ukraine, after such reconstruction, the building is considered a newly created object by its owner," “Sinevo Ukraine” assures.
At the same time, the company notes that SBI seized the building without officially notifying the “Sinevo Ukraine” company and the owner of the building, the Cypriot company Linkmix Holdings Limited, and also did not summon the representatives of the companies to the court hearing. “Sinevo” learned about the arrest only after the corresponding entry appeared in the state register.
The reaction of SBI
The Bureau confirms the seizure of the premises as part of the investigation into the illegal expropriation of the complex of state-owned enterprises. However, the bureau says that it did not conduct any investigative actions against Sinevo that could stop the companyʼs work. The arrest itself was imposed by the investigative judge in 2022, but "no obstacles in the provision of medical services arose and do not arise today."
The investigation itself has been ongoing since 2022. Investigators are investigating a possible illegal expropriation, which was behind the employees of one of the ministries, the State Property Fund and the state enterprise of the Ukrainian Research Institute of the Oil Refinery Industry MASMA.
- The European network of medical laboratories "Sinevo Ukraine" is the largest in Ukraine. Sinevo has 340 laboratory departments, eight laboratories (in Kyiv, Lviv, Chernivtsi, Vinnytsia, Odesa, Kherson, Dnipro and Kharkiv) and more than 2,300 employees in 139 settlements of the country.
- The laboratory was started in 2007 in Kyiv. Today, the “Sinevo Ukraine” network is able to perform more than 800 types of tests and serves almost 4 million customers every year, performing more than 20 million tests.
- The "Sinevo Ukraine" is a part of Medicover, an international company in the field of healthcare and diagnostic services. The “Sinevo” international laboratory network is represented in ten European countries, and “Sinevo” laboratories operate in Germany, Poland, Romania, Turkey, Georgia, Moldova, Bulgaria, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina. In 2017, Sinevo Ukraine as part of the “Medicover” was registered on Nasdaq (Stockholm), becoming the first and only medical company in Ukraine that is a member of the IRO. In 2023, “Sinevo Ukraine” paid more than 310 million hryvnias in taxes and fees to the budget of Ukraine.