The Pill Club takes on primary care with $41.9M in fresh funding – TechCrunch

In January, former Uber executive Liz Meyerdirk announced that she had taken over the running of The Pill Club. The company, which provides online birth control prescribing and delivery services to hundreds of thousands of women, had achieved record revenues, surpassing an annual running rate of $ 100 million for the first time in its 4-year history.

Finding that the bridge between ridesharing and healthcare was smoother than some might expect, she said she was focused on how to use technology “in logistics for an everyday use case, [to know] how that simplifies your everyday life. “

Now, six months after her new job, Meyerdirk announced that her company has raised more capital to capitalize on the current momentum in women’s health. The Pill Club announced today that it has received a Base 10-led Series B extension of 41.9 million George Ruan and iGlobe.

The renewal round comes over 2 years after the company announced its first investment in the Series B, a $ 51 million financing led by VMG Partners. After the company was reportedly valued at $ 250 million, the company declined to provide its latest valuation, other than that the extension was an upward round.

When a customer joins The Pill Club, they will receive a medical questionnaire and a digital form to enter personal information. The company gives them a sense of how much the service will cost and if the price works they will connect them to a nurse either live or via text message.

“If you are lucky, you can see a nurse right away,” she said. “When it’s midnight, of course, we haven’t found out yet.” The nurse goes through different options because, Meyerdirk added, “contraception is not one size fits all”.

Once a customer has made a decision, The Pill Club can then prescribe contraceptives in their own pharmacy, which will be delivered to their door within two or three days.

The Pill Club launched a birth control home delivery service in 2016. It launched in 43 states and the District of Columbia between 2016 and January 2021. It has added 5 new states in the past six months and plans to reach 50 states by the end of 2021.

The company makes money from doctor visits, insurance reimbursements for prescription drugs, and cash patients not covered by insurance.

The CEO sees a large part of his value proposition in embedding it in his clients’ existing insurance plans, including Medi-CAL and Family PACT. In the past three months, 16% of The Pill Clubs’ new patients were taking Medicaid.

“You have companies like Oscar [Health] who are reinventing health insurance and you have Ro, Hims and Hers who are [taking] Cash as the primary … way to serve patients, ”she said. “This is fantastic for those who can afford it, but for us, since a large part of our value system revolves around access to equity, we believe everyone should have the right to access birth control.”

The company believes it has to work within the insurance system to have real innovation.

“Telemedicine that ignores the reality of insurance will always have a limited slice of the pie,” said a company spokesman. “Cash-only systems are simply not a product for a scale. A truly innovative health platform exists within the realities of the system. “

By women for women

In the long term, the Pill Club wants to replace the old model of annual family doctor visits with ongoing care for women.

“I am generally healthy [but] I actually have questions about mammograms … colonoscopies or something, ”Meyerdirk said. “And being able to have someone other than my mother” with whom you don’t have to go to the doctor or need urgent help is the void The Pill Club wants to close.

“We think it’s too good to be true when we actually get what we deserve,” says Meyerdirk, describing women’s health. Part of her future goal is to think beyond birth control and find out how The Pill Club could digitally refresh other areas of women’s health.

In March, the company launched a dermatology pilot and also expanded its 2020 period care pilot project. Part of the new capital is dedicated to launching new services for members.

The Pill Club also shared the diversity metrics of its 350-strong workforce as part of its announcement.

In the Pill Club, 72% of employees identify as women and 28% of employees as men. The management also sees predominantly women, with a ratio of 62.5% women and 37.5% men. When it comes to racial diversity, the company lists a total of 33% white, 19% Asian, 16% Hispanic or Latino, and 14% black or African American.

“We are made by women for women,” said Meyerdirk. “It’s very, very different when you’re by men, for women.” Her appointment came as founder and former CEO of The Pill Club, Nick Chang, who stepped down from day-to-day operations. He has not taken a seat on the board, but still holds shares in the company.

Liz Meyerdirk, General Manager of The Pill Club.

The wave of prescription drug-by-mail is growing, with the Pill Club joining startups like Nurx and Simply Health and bigger companies like Walmart and Amazon.

“The idea of ​​creating more choice and flexibility across healthcare is long overdue,” she said. “Everyone deserves to have great options when considering who can best meet their daily needs.”

Editor’s Note: An earlier version of this story indicated that The Pill Club is performing birth control for pick-up. This is wrong. It supplies birth control through its own pharmacies. A correction has been made to reflect this change.

source https://dailyhealthynews.ca/the-pill-club-takes-on-primary-care-with-41-9m-in-fresh-funding-techcrunch/