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M&A WATCH-
HO Group is now the sole owner of UCP:HO Group ’s pharma arm Middle EastChemicals (MEC) has bought back a 50% stake in its subsidiary pharma distributor United Company of Pharmacists (UCP), giving it full ownership of the company, Al Mal reported, citing sources close to the matter. MEC bought back its shares from US-based wholesale company Cencora (formerly known as AmerisourceBergen) in a USD 50 mn transaction. The pharma distributor has been on the lookout for new finance sources to resolve a growing debt problem.
Goodbye, rumored Saudi shareholder: Asharq Business reported earlier this month that Saudi Arabia’s medical supplies giant Tamer Group was close to acquiring a 30% stake in UCP from Cencora.
TECH-
Safer Egyptian cities: Our friends at Hassan Allam Construction have inked an agreement with French defense and security firm Thales to develop a digital platform, based on big data and AI, that will enhance and automate security systems in cities across Egypt and the region, the two companies said in a joint statement (pdf).
INFRASTRUCTURE-
Elsewedy Electric grows footprint in Saudi: The Saudi arm of Elsewedy Electric has signed a SAR 59 mn (USD 15.7 mn) agreement with the state-owned electricity distributor Saudi Electricity Company to build a new turnkey underground cable project in Mecca, it said in a LinkedIn post yesterday. The project will link a new 110/13.8 kV substation with the existing 110 kV network in Mecca, and it comes as part of a wider plan to increase the capacity of the electricity network in larger cities in the country.
ENERGY-
Oriental Weavers factory goes green: Oriental Weavers will start operating one of its Tenth of Ramadan factories using renewable energy, the company said in a statement (pdf). Under an agreement with Amarenco Solarize, the solar power producer will provide the factory with a solar power station with a capacity of 1.3 MW, covering 80% of the factory’s energy consumption. The move will reduce the factory’s carbon emissions by 2.3k tons a year.
