I think it's crazy that there's no news about it here yet, even though we have so many enthusiastic fans of $BNTX (+1,13%) among us. In my opinion, this topic should definitely be discussed a bit.
At the moment, BiontTech is planning to close virtually all its sites in Germany and lay off everyone who works there. More than 1900 employees are currently facing redundancy. That doesn't sound good, but it doesn't sound like a scandal either. Until you actually read the press releases to the end and find out what is really going on there.
What many people may not have realized is that BionTech took over its German competitor CureVac just a few months ago. Its production sites are even to be almost completely closed. Which of course raises a clear question: Why would you buy a company for money only to close it down?
The founder of CureVac, Ingmar Hoerr, provides an answer. He accuses BionTech of deception and explains that the takeover was probably mainly done to avoid legal disputes with CureVac and to secure patents. There was no interest at all in the actual company.
The chronology of events is also interesting. In January, the most important competitor was bought - which required the approval of the German authorities. In March, Ugur Sahin and his wife surprisingly leave their own company and want virtually nothing more to do with it. And in May, they suddenly come up with the idea of virtually winding up the entire shed by closing the central research and production sites.
Interesting ... interesting. And the state is snubbed on the one hand. About the fact that the company is publicly turning its back on the Federal Republic. About the fact that when the license for CureVac was granted, it was certainly not agreed that the competitor would only be bought in order to destroy it. About the fact that many well-paid jobs will be destroyed and millions in tax revenue will be lost. But on the other hand, the state is also up to its neck in the BionTech affair.
The BionTech Group is widely known. The company was founded by Ugur Sahin, his wife Özlem and a third guy who nobody is interested in because he has a German-speaking first name. Interestingly, the founding of the company by these three outstanding scientists was largely financed by taxpayers' money.
Then there was the well-known pandemic in which the state broke virtually all the rules to help BionTech. The company was granted special permits and emergency approvals even though the formal legal and scientific requirements were not, or at least not yet, in place. In addition, massive amounts of money were again spent to support BionTech financially.
There was also massive support from public media and institutes such as the RKI. Wikipedia still contains the information that the vaccine is 98% effective. Meanwhile, the RKI now only speaks of a "moderate protective effect" (quote from the website as at 10.12.2025) and links to studies by the ECDC that are less and less enthusiastic the more up-to-date the data becomes.
Yes, and here we are today. BionTech officially speaks of a "demand problem". That must be satire. Brother, your demand actually consisted of nothing other than "You inject yourself with this right now, otherwise you won't be allowed in the EDEKA".
And what's even worse is that BionTech can't really have any money problems. So they actually had a kind of infinite money cheat for a short time and instead of applying even a little bit of conservative German accounting, for years they have done nothing but buy pretty much every competitor in the biotechnology sector that can possibly exist in the world. I'm not kidding you when I say that they've even set up a site in Rwanda. However, they still don't have a single useful drug to show for it. True to the motto "If we can't get anything done, we can at least make sure that the others can't get anything done either"
For me, BionTech is and remains a red rag. A company whose business model is not vaccines, but bad sleight of hand. The decision to leave Germany cannot be due to the location. Nor can it be because of the money, because if I have seen correctly there is still 13 billion in cash in the account. From my point of view, it can only be due to the fact that they are strategically withdrawing before anyone gets the idea of launching a raid or a parliamentary committee of inquiry.
*(Private expression of opinion, no investment advice on this account)
