No, George Soros and Bill Gates did not own Mologic before COVID-19 pandemic

What is the claim? 

Social media users have claimed that American philanthropists George Soros and Bill Gates owned Mologic—a company producing COVID-19 rapid test kits—before the pandemic. These posts speculate that the pandemic was planned and executed by global elites.

A post on Instagram (archived here) featured a screenshot of the post from X (formerly Twitter) by an account named Liz Churchill, known for spreading misinformation. The post read: "George Soros and Bill Gates had a company that made 'Rapid Covid Tests'... before the 'Pandemic' and called it Mologic Ltd. It's TIME for 'Covid' Accountability. The Pandemic Planners must be prosecuted." The caption above the screenshot stated, "These 2 should be on death row for the genocide and crimes against humanity they have perpetrated on society, for profit and control."

Multiple posts on X and Facebook have also shared the claim, and the archives of these posts can be found here, here, here, here, here and here. 

Screenshots of viral posts circulating on social media. (Source: X/Facebook/Screenshot/Modified by Logically Facts) 

However, we found that Soros and Gates acquired Mologic in 2021, a year after the pandemic, not before. Mologic began producing COVID-19 test kits in March 2020, after the pandemic was declared.  

What did we find? 

A Google search led us to reports published by the Financial Times, Forbes, and The Telegraph in July 2021. These reports stated that Gates and Soros were part of a consortium that bought Mologic, a U.K. company that developed rapid diagnostic technologies for tropical diseases, including COVID-19.

We also found the Mologic and Soros' Open Society Foundations press releases dated July 2021. The press releases noted that the group of investors, led by the Soros Economic Development Fund (SEDF) and supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, launched Global Access Health (GAH), a social enterprise that would acquire Mologic and seek to expand access to advanced, high-quality medical technology in countries of the Global South region.

It also stated that Mologic was founded in 2003 by Mark Davis and his father, Professor Paul Davis, one of the creators of the ClearBlue home pregnancy test. It added that the company had received significant grant funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation for its extensive work in developing affordable diagnostic kits for various tropical diseases. We found that in 2016, the foundation partnered with Mologic and established an entity within the company focused on lowering the cost of rapid diagnostics. 

Additionally, we discovered that before the COVID-19 pandemic, Mologic collaborated with companies like PATH (a global health organization) and Sherlock Biosciences (a biotechnology company) in 2018 and 2019 to develop a new rapid diagnostic test for malaria and molecular diagnostic testing, respectively, which the Gates Foundation facilitated. None of these were related to COVID-19 test kits.

It is important to note that Mologic began making rapid diagnostic test kits for COVID-19 only in March 2020, after the pandemic was declared. Reportedly, Mologic received funding from the U.K. government’s Department for International Development (DFID) and partnered with Omega Diagnostics Ltd. to manufacture its first kits.

Moreover, as claimed in the viral posts that COVID-19 was planned, a narrative taken from the New World Order (NWO) conspiracy theory, which purports that the "elites" are planning to drag humans into totalitarian dystopia. Logically Facts has also regularly debunked such narratives, which can be read here, here, and here.

The verdict

George Soros and Bill Gates acquired Mologic, a company that produces rapid diagnostic kits, in 2021. Mologic began making COVID-19 test kits in March 2020, after the pandemic started, not before.