Expressions of patriotic praise filled several Iranian media outlets May 6 after the country said its first cargo of 40,000 indigenous COVID-19 testing kits had been exported to Germany. According to the Iranian vice president for science and technology, Sorena Sattari, the delivery was proof that Iran has reached a state of self-sufficiency for the domestic procurement of those kits. He also pushed the bar higher: Millions of such kits are planned to be sent overseas. 

The kits were developed by Pishtaz Teb Diagnostics, a company that has been focused on laboratory research and medical diagnosis tools since 1988. The company’s website doesn’t specify its affiliation and funding sources.

Already approved by Iran’s Health Ministry, another batch of the same kits are also expected to reach Turkey soon. Company officials have spoken of similar orders placed by a host of other countries, including Spain and Brazil.

Javan, a hard-line paper affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), took pride in how Iranian kits had now reached “the heart of Europe’s most medically advanced nation,” Germany. “While the coronavirus crisis has grounded the biggest medical powers, Iranian experts have not only supplied the demand at home but are now finding clients abroad in Europe,” the paper wrote.