Pharmaniaga was given a conditional agreement to continue supplying medical supplies to the government for 10 years in January 2022 subject to the agreement on the terms, which were supposed to be finalised before Dec 31, 2022.

The pharmaceutical company was then given a six-month extension to continue its supply till the end of June pending the finalisation of the new concession deal.

“We really need them and it is our responsibility to try and help them since it’s a GLC,” Zaliha said at a press conference here today.

She did not state if the new concession agreement was for 10 years.

In February, Pharmaniaga fell under the Practice Note 17 (PN17) classification for financially distressed companies after posting its largest ever quarterly net loss of RM664.39 million in the fourth quarter ended Dec 31, 2022.

It said it had taken a RM552.3 million impairment on unsold Covid-19 vaccines and also wrote down the goodwill of its Indonesian manufacturing cash-generating units of RM50.3 million.

Pharmaniaga, a subsidiary of Boustead Holdings, is one of Malaysia’s largest listed integrated pharmaceutical groups and has lucrative contracts with the government, including the provision of Covid-19 vaccines.

It has supplied 20.4 million doses of Sinovac Covid-19 vaccine to the government and 2.5 million doses of Covid-19 vaccine to the private market, according to its website.

The company attributed its challenging financial year to the provision of the “slow-moving stocks of Covid-19 vaccines with shelf life in its inventory”, which resulted in a loss after taxation of RM605 million.

Revenue tumbled 27.1% to RM3.51 billion from RM4.82 billion as there was lower demand from the government for the purchase of Covid-19 vaccines.

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