September 26th, 2022 –  We are delighted to announce that our partner Mawi DNA Technologies (Mawi), a medical device company focusing on the development of innovative technologies for biological sample collection announced today that it has signed Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) agreements with the Moroccan Ministry of Investment, Convergence and Public Policies as well as with the Moroccan Ministry of Industry and Commerce to explore a Joint Venture with Mawi’s local partner Biotessia to establish a state of the art manufacturing facility in Morocco to serve the African market.

“We are excited for the opportunity to expand into Africa through this Joint Venture with Biotessia as we feel our technology offers unique solutions that directly address the challenges of collecting viable biological samples throughout the African continent. Mawi’s core technology enables universal collection among family members and long term stability of collected samples at a wide range of temperatures, increasing access to essentially any population segment regardless of geography or location. This in turn improves potential health outcomes due to increased diversity in sample availability.” commented Dr. Bassam El Fahmawi, CEO at Mawi.

Mawi has developed  iSWAB-Microbiome-EL, a product that is being extensively deployed worldwide for population-scale surveillance testing for infectious diseases, notably Covid-19 and its variants due to its unique properties of viral inactivation, non-toxic formation, and enabling labs to skip the RNA extraction step, reducing costs and increasing testing throughput. Mawi also has a broad portfolio of iSWAB sample collection technologies for mammalian DNA, RNA, intact cells, and microbiome (fecal, soil, surface, and skin), in addition to the HemaSure-OMICS whole blood collection technology allowing RNA, CTC, cfDNA, and genomic DNA to be isolated from a single sample. Mawi’s blood collection technology is already being deployed in Kenya for HIV monitoring.

Mohcine Jazouli, minister of Investment added that: “The exchange with MawiDNA and Biotressia was very promising and conducive to accelerate the project of building a manufacturing unit in Morocco.”

Dr. Hanane Chaibanou, CEO of Biotessia added: “This project is aligned with Biotessia’s strategy and  Morocco’s vision to attract foreign investments and insure local health needs”.