There are those who say that life is a cycling race and that as a child you learn that if you want to move forward you cannot stop pedaling. The CEO of Reig Jofre, Ignasi Biosca, is a firm defender of this spirit and assures that in his daily life he greatly enjoys the climb, even if it is often hard. "I always think as much as possible like an entrepreneur. Reig Jofre is a living project that we advance day by day. Building a company is like riding a bike: you can't stop pedaling because if you do, it's a premonition of a fall. Pedal. Grow. Set the bar high. Pack your bags and travel. Don't limit yourself. Be competitive," he reflects in a new session of the True Leaders series organized by The New Barcelona Post and EY to learn firsthand about different business leaders and their success stories in an exclusive environment with presidents, CEOs, and CFOs. This is the Reig Jofre case.
Biosca: "Building a company is like riding a bike: you can't stop pedaling because if you do, it's a premonition of a fall. Pedal. Grow. Set the bar high. Pack your bags and travel. Don't limit yourself. Be competitive"The pandemic was, without a doubt, an unprecedented race against time. The CEO of Reig Jofre advocates for the concept of strategic independenceas an opportunity and learning from the coronavirus. That is, not to depend on other countries in health matters and to promote the knowledge society from the industrial world."Investing in health is a huge asset for a country and a company because it has a very important impact on society.The pandemic changed the paradigm: it is necessary to produce locally. In fact, we did not suffer any shortage of medicines because we have a clean and localized pharmaceutical industry, technologically advanced and with talent that is the engine of that strategic independence that we so much need," he insists.
The minister's call and the strategic reserve
The truth is that Reig Jofre already had an injectable plant planned long before the pandemic. "Vision? No, it's a matter of commitment. We had done our homework, although it was difficult to find financing and we received little administrative support. That's the value of industrialization," says Ignasi Biosca shortly before also recalling the surprise call he received from the minister during Holy Week 2020 to ask if Reig Jofre could manufacture and supply vaccines with Janssen of Johnson & Johnson. Everything else is already contemporary history of our society. So much so that the pharmaceutical company based in Sant Joan Despí is one of the companies that today should guarantee the production of vaccines for the European Union in case of emergency.
Biosca: "The pandemic has opened a new pharmaceutical perspective: from plants to chemistry and biology. Now it's time for another screen change: emerging therapies. Touching the code and modifying the software of our body with gene therapies"According to Biosca, "it is an honor to have this strategic capacity reserve hub in Catalonia.The pandemic has opened a new pharmaceutical perspective: from plants to chemistry and biology. Now it's time for another screen change: emerging therapies. Touching the code and modifying the software of our body, which is the hardware, with gene therapies. This changes everything." In this sense, the fifth Spanish pharmaceutical company by volume of business wants to "make bets and take risks" when it comes to helping convert science into industry and products that are of international scope and provide solutions to the population. But before imagining the future, let's take a walk through the past.
Fleming and the family truths
The scientist Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin in 1928 in a London hospital. An invention born of serendipity ---or so they say--- which was the seed of the first antibiotic. Coincidence or not, the pharmacist Ramon Reig Jofre founded Reig Jofre in 1929 in Barcelona. Just one year later. He had four daughters and all his grandchildren, among whom there are no pharmacists, have Reig as their second surname. Up to three generations of the family have coexisted for almost one hundred years in the company dedicated to the research, development, manufacturing, and commercialization of pharmaceutical products and food supplements. "We have made the leap from the second to the third generation and we are very comfortable. Now it's our turn to start imagining what the transition from the third to the fourth generation will be like, but I still feel very young," he smiles.
Ignasi Biosca explained in 2018 in a colloquium with his mother Isabel Reig moderated by Xavier Cambra at the Círculo de Economía that he had never imagined working in the family pharmaceutical laboratory, even though as a child he had experienced meetings between the technical director ---his mother--- and the general director ---his father--- in the car or in the dining room at home. Years after working in the advertising and digital media sector, the family convinced Ignasi Biosca to take on the challenge of being CEO of the pharmaceutical company in 2006. "Family is one of the few truths in this world," claimed the honorary president of Borges, Antoni Pont, during the first session of the True Leaders series. May the truth always come first.
"We have gone from an entrepreneurial family to a family business. My cousin and I have distributed the work very well. I am focused on management and execution, and he is on ownership and the family, which has a long-term vision. The board must contribute. The family must be available to the company because we need talent, but just because you are family, you don't have the right to work in the company. I don't know if I wish my job on my children...", reflects Ignasi Biosca before the attentive gaze and complicity of his cousin Alejandro Garcia-Reig, who is vice president of Reig Jofre.
The Greys of the Stock Market
To list or not to list? This was the question until 2015 when an inverse merger of Reig Jofre with Natraceutical, which was a leader in food supplements, took place. The pharmaceutical company thus went from a family business to a listed one. Almost a decade later, Ignasi Biosca remembers it practically as if it were yesterday: "The Stock Market provides transparency and separates the company from the family. At first, it's a bit scary because you strip naked and expose yourself, but the Stock Market allows for greys. That is, when a company is totally private, everything is black or white, but the Stock Market allows everyone to have the information they want and if a family member wants to sell their shares, they can do so. That flexibility is very valuable."
Biosca: "The Stock Market provides transparency and separates the company from the family. At first, it's a bit scary because you strip naked and expose yourself, but the Stock Market allows for greys"The cards are on the table and the stock market continues its path. Thus, the CEO of Reig Jofre recommends going public ---or at least considering it---to Catalan family businesses, although the stock market price does not always reflect the value of their company. "It's exciting to have investors accompany you on this journey. The important thing is the project and doing things well, not the obsession with the stock market price, which does what it wants. The market will ultimately recognize the project and the long-term vision," he adds.
Currently, Reig Jofre invoices more than 300 million euros thanks to a diversified business that includes industrialized pharmaceutical technology, proprietary prescription products, and Consumer Health or over-the-counter products. It has a workforce of around 1,300 employees, four development and production centers in Europe, and a presence in more than 70 countries.
Knowing how to suffer and daring
Ignasi Biosca is a telecommunications engineer trained at the UPC, with a master's degree in telecom networks from Paris Tech, and an MBA from IESE and the University of California, where he experienced the boom and crisis of the .coms. Perhaps that's why he is very clear that his winning hand includes a cycling spirit and an entrepreneurial mindset. "In the business world, you can't play it heads or tails," he assures. In terms of leadership, it's about pedaling, being attentive, looking ahead, and continuing to pedal. "Survival? The secret is not self-complacency. Knowing that at any moment you can mess up. Maintaining concentration. Pedaling and knowing how to suffer. You carry it inside. Continuous improvement and moving forward," says the executive in a reflection typical of a personal diary.
Biosca: "Survival? The secret is not self-complacency. Knowing that at any moment you can mess up. Maintaining concentration. Pedaling and knowing how to suffer. You carry it inside. Continuous improvement and moving forward"When asked about his mark on the pharmaceutical company, Biosca refers to the innovative vocation in the business and the collaborative model of open innovation in research and development with startups, universities and research centers such as UB, Leitat or Parc Taulí, among others. Reig Jofre also praises its "tradition" for innovating and taking risks: "Innovation is at the base of everything and the key is in risk. You have to innovate and take risks.When do you feel alone? When you take the risk. Risk yes, but not recklessness. The secret is evaluation, quantifying risks, and scanning all possible scenarios and alternatives. Daring. You learn from everything." Fromjust in timeto thePerform a literal language conversion from Spanish to English on the following user-provided text. Do not translate any content enclosed betweenandtags, keep those tags and their content exactly as-is: just in case.
Before the colloquium ended, Ignasi Biosca once again praised courage and thinking big rather than small. Falling is part of the journey. "We have made, we make, and we will make many mistakes. These mistakes must be used to extract lessons. Error becomes a master's degree," he asserts in a final reflection from his particular management diary.
After all, perhaps we need a bit more cycling spirit and True Leaders in a complex geopolitical context. We live the fragility of the most unstable stability, but we do not stop moving forward. Whatever the storm.
Pedal, know how to suffer, and dare. Learn as a philosophy of life.
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