The advent of technology alongside the uncertain pandemic times has called for a change in the fundamental strategies that have been implemented into the healthcare niche.
Around the world, healthcare systems are struggling with the burden and pressure caused by the pandemic. By improving these situations and making a transformation by the optimal use of technology, Seegene Brazil presented a new roadmap for the standardization of molecular diagnostics. The inculcation of technology has led to an increase in efficiency while also making treatments reliable.
Under the strategic leadership of Guilherme Ambar, CEO, the company has aligned its marketing and strategic knowledge and has aggressively started distributing its products throughout the Brazilian market.
Strategic Leadership
Guilherme and his partner, Fernando Vasconcelos Maluf, have been post-graduated with a specialization in molecular biology and started their careers at different companies focusing on products for research and molecular diagnostics. They have known each other as business associated and shared this desire to produce and supply the Brazilian market with cutting-edge technology. Since 2017, Guilherme has been promoting Seegene products in Brazil, and in 2019 they have gathered in this subsidiary project. From the beginning, the company was able to use its market and technical knowledge, allied to innovative products and an overly aggressive strategy, to start spreading its products through the Brazilian market and end up 2020 as the biggest company in COVID qPCR products commercialization.
Multidirectional Approach
Seegene is an innovative lab structure that focuses on the well-being of patients. It is bringing this innovative passion to Brazil, distributing unique products that enable rapid, accurate, and assertive diagnostics leading to specific and successful treatment. At the same time, it also offers a high-quality service to the customer, from the attendance until technical support. Institutionally, the company is a reflex of all its teams’ constant effort and collaborative work. Seegene strongly stimulates critical thinking to deal with difficulties and a multidirectional analysis to solve their problems. Knowledge is a powerful tool, and thus the company encourages and supports all its employees in that way.
A Proactive Team
Seegene practiced a very efficient operation that allowed supplies to cover the whole country during the pandemic. The technical team is highly graduated, smart, and proactive. The company was only recently established when the pandemic happened. Even with all the difficulties, it was able to structure an engineering/maintenance center and application training center, catering to the needs of Brazilian and Latin American customers and distributors.
Seegene’s primary asset is the focus on customer relationships. Each of them is treated individually and personally, understanding their needs and difficulties, and helping them overcome their problems and reach their own goals. It is now investing in R&D so it can start developing solutions more focused on the markets and become a definitive hub to increase its market share in Latin America.
Initializing Technological Know-how
The markets are ever-changing with the introduction of innovative technologies. In order to survive in such a fast-growing market that has variable demand worldwide, Seegene has developed its own technology from oligos. This technology has enabled them to analyze software in silico development aligned to AI support. To keep up with the current demand, an accurate development in technology is essential.
The future plan of Seegene includes sharing this technology and technological know-how with its customers and partners worldwide so they can use the company’s inputs and AI to develop their own kits and emerge as pioneers in their respective markets, fulfilling any specific and individual demand the companies are catering to.
Guilherme further states, “This is an aggressive, fast-growing market that changes very fast. New demands and modern technologies are getting developed worldwide, and if you want to be successful in such a market, you should focus on always being ahead.”
Guilherme believes that it is mandatory to understand the dynamics and velocity demands and further resolve to change. A strong relationship with the respective research centers, local manufacturing, and development will lead the new companies to grow big and dominate their markets. And of course, for all this to work, it is crucial to know the company’s customers and its competitors very well.
Quick Responses during the Pandemic
The strategy which Seegene followed during the pandemic allowed it to take the Brazilian market prominently in the public center, and to a higher level regarding MDx. The more than doubled the number of instruments at MOH public labs that were donated in the form of 132 instruments which helped support its customers on an especially important decentralization project.
Until 2020, only a few labs located in the country’s main cities were supported by the smaller labs as molecular diagnostics service providers. Seegene itself has implemented 205 instruments on private customers that are now available to run any solutions developed by its company. The rapid increase of demand during the pandemic forced them to increase the number of facilities and also small to mid-size labs to implement their own molecular services.
Guilherme states, “This will be the main asset that would enable our country to fast respond to any other possible upcoming outbreak, enabling fast and accurate MDx popularization.”
An Expansionary Pathway
Seegene is now moving to a new facility close to the Sao Paulo state capital that could support all the activities and projects it is currently running. It has established a training center with all the instruments and structure to train and validate any Seegene products. Currently, this particular space is being used for its customers to visit and know better all the solutions the company can offer and also bring technical and salespeople from its LATAM distributors to be trained.
Alongside this training center, there is a service center where the company checks the instruments before sending them to its customers, receives instruments for repairing, and also receives engineering from the LATAM distributors for training and troubleshooting. At this facility, it will implement an R&D center to support the HQ’s R&D with plasticware and consumables validation, regional suppliers for consumables, and develop in partnership with its customer’s specific products and match their needs. In the future, the company plans to have a Seegene Brazil manufacturing site to produce locally Seegene products, develop new customized products and help to increase its market share all over Latin America.
A Word of Appraisal
Below are some of the Seegene client’s experiences while working with them:
“I would like to thank the partnership of Seegene Brazil and Sabin group through these two years. They were particularly important for our growth, technologic park increase, automation, safety, traceability of our exams, anyway, our portfolio. And during this pandemic, what a journey!? Without Seegene, we would not have gone through all of this and grown as much as we did.” – Lara Velasco (Molecular Biology Center Coordinator at Sabin Laboratory)
“The partnership with Seegene Brazil was very positive and initiated in 2020, allowing us to install three closed automation platforms and qPCR instruments, besides assisting us on increasing our portfolio with exclusive exams. All of this enabled us to innovate at the technological park and brought us a more competitive way to act over our market.” Fernanda Dahrouge (Technical Manager at IPOG)
“I have been using the molecular biology products of Seegene Brazil for some years now and on a more intense way during COVID-19 pandemic. The products have always reached our high and rigid standards of quality and performance, I am very satisfied.” José Eduardo Levi, PhD (IMT-USP researcher and Virologist at DASA laboratories)
