PersonalRX
About this raise
PersonalRX, with a $30 million valuation cap, is raising funds on Wefunder. It is a home-delivery pharmacy that places patients at the center of their care model. The pharmacy provides VIP services and packaging to improve patient compliance, along with a dedicated pharmacy technician for each patient. Lawrence Margolis founded PersonalRX in 2009. The current round of crowdfunding has a minimum raise of $50,000 and a maximum raise of $1,070,000, and the proceeds will be used for marketing, overhead expenses, rent, utilities, technology, and short-term debt repayment. PersonalRX has already shipped 10 million dose packs and generated revenue of over $26 million. The company uses its RX2 Mobile app and monthly Care Calls to care for its patients.
Investment Overview
Invested $175,217 :
Deal Terms
Company & Team
Company
- Year Founded
- 2009
- Industry
- Healthcare & Pharmaceuticals
- Tech Sector
- Distribution Model
- B2C
- Margin
- High
- Capital Intensity
- High
Financials
- Revenue -6.1% YoY
- $1,549,232
- Monthly Burn
- $233,661
-
Runway
- 0 months
- Gross Margin
- 4%
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Synopsis
The COVID-19 pandemic showed the world that getting things delivered can be just as viable as picking something up from the store. The prescription medication industry is no outlier – pharmaceutical delivery has been on the rise due to the pandemic. The rise of delivery of prescription drugs has been noticed by companies across the industry in the past year. CVS saw deliveries increase tenfold in the first three months of 2020, and Cigna and Walgreens shared similar results. The competition in the field is stiff with national, recognizable names.
PersonalRX is a company operating in this lane, providing individualized treatment that stands out among its competitors. The company not only delivers patients’ medications, it also packages the medications into dose packets to make it easier for people to adhere to medical instructions. PersonalRX provides each patient with a phone number to contact their pharmacist directly as needed. Patients also receive medication reminders and shipping notifications through PersonalRX’s app.
The time for PersonalRX to boom as a business couldn’t be better. The company is licensed in 38 states and delivered its 10 millionth pill package recently, showing that the ten-year-old company has solid traction. It is focused on the 41 million Americans taking five or more medications and wants to provide a personal touch that PersonalRX hopes will make it stand out from the competition.
PersonalRX’s current Wefunder raise has been rated a Neutral Deal by the KingsCrowd investment team.
Price
PersonalRX is raising via a SAFE at a $30 million valuation with no discount. Although this amount is much higher than many other startups currently seeking capital, the company does have healthy revenue figures — $1.59 million last year — to back it up. However, the lack of discount is not particularly attractive for investors. Thus, the price score for PersonalRX is just slightly above average.
Market
The pharmaceutical and drug store market is valued at $319.3 billion globally and is expected to increase 3.3% in 2021. The online pharmacy market is expected to reach revenues of $131 billion by 2025, which may be more in line with the total addressable market of PersonalRX. The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the adoption of delivery services with noted increases in various delivery industries (most notably, DoorDash recently completed its IPO at a lofty valuation), so PersonalRX is in the right industry at the right time. Its market score is quite high in reflection of these factors.
Team
The founder and CEO of PersonalRX is Lawrence Margolis. A former Wall Street broker, he specialized in the health and technology spaces while working in finance. Margolis is joined by the president and COO Charles Oestricher, who brings industry experience to the team. Oestreicher previously worked at CVS Health, Express Scripts, and Medco Health Services. His experience working within this industry, coupled with Margolis’s business knowledge does make for a solid executive team. However, the founder’s dedication to the company could be called into question. Margolis also acts as the CEO of Health Tech Harbor, Inc. alongside his work with PersonalRX.
Margolis and Oestreicher are joined by CTO Vaibhav Khullar, who has previously held senior and executive roles at Barclays and Credit Suisse. Lastly, there is Director of Pharmacy Operations Gillian Giannone, who has worked as a clinical pharmacist at Express Scripts and a staff pharmacist at Geriscript Pharmacy.
With its mix of financial know-how and industry experience, the PersonalRX team is decent. However, Margolis’s lack of full-time dedication to the company is somewhat concerning. Thus, the team score for PersonalRX is slightly above average.
Differentiators
PersonalRX’s biggest appeal is given away in its name — personal touch. The company offers pharmacists available around the clock, and it fully packages and sorts deliveries for customers with no added cost. Customers are given the direct phone numbers of the pharmacy technicians working on their orders. As a result, consumers are given insight into the process and a direct line of communication with someone inside the company. PersonalRX’s RX2 mobile app also allows customers to have visibility over the entire process while also enabling the company itself to oversee end-to-end workflow, improving on the system wherever possible.
However, PersonalRX faces major competition in the online pharmacy market. Massive, publicly traded companies stand in PersonalRX’s way to mainstream success. CVS, Walgreens, and Cigna make up 53.7% of the market share within the prescription drug market, and other big-name companies like Kroger, Walmart, and UnitedHealth Group push that number close to 65%. However, none of these name brand competitors offer the personalized experience that PersonalRX emphasizes for its customers. Therefore, the company’s differentiators score is its highest across all five metrics.
Performance
PersonalRX’s traction thus far has been solid. The company has existing partnerships with companies specializing in pharmacy benefits management, home healthcare, and digital lead generation. This will allow PersonalRX to scale its business at a faster rate.
Financially, PersonalRX also has some traction. The company saw $1.5 million in revenue in the most recent fiscal year, although this was paired with a -$2.8 million net income. PersonalRX also has a large amount of debt, with just over $10 million in short-term debt and around $304,000 in long term. Given the company’s status as not profitable and its high monthly burn rate (around $233,000), this debt situation looks worrisome. However, the company just sold its 10 millionth pill package this year, showing that it does have existing and repeating customers. Balancing its healthy revenue against major debt and a high burn rate, the performance score for PersonalRX is middling.
Bearish Outlook
While the space itself may be growing, so are the competitors. PersonalRX is trying to make a name for itself in an industry that already has many companies with names known far and wide, including CVS, Cigna, Walgreens, Kroger, Walmart, and even Amazon. If any of these companies pivots to offering services similar to PersonalRX, it could struggle to attract consumer attention. Pairing this with an already high valuation, PersonalRX will need to overcome quite a lot in order to be a profitable investment.
Bullish Outlook
PersonalRX is completely up and running, with 10 million pill packages sold and $26 million dollars in revenue throughout the company’s existence. The early traction shows that the company is on the right path towards success. It is working with a digital lead generation company to capitalize on marketing opportunities and gain new customers. The executive team is strong with solid insider experience and has a signed partnership with a Fortune 500 pharmacy benefits management company as well. The industry as a whole is growing, increasingly so in the midst of the pandemic, which means there is more demand than ever. PersonalRX may very well capitalize on its growing success and earn a significant market share.
Executive Summary
The drug prescription delivery industry has been catapulted into the mainstream in 2020 and 2021 due to the pandemic. PersonalRX looks to capitalize on this increased market share and offers a personalized pharmaceutical experience. It signed partnerships that indicate future growth opportunities and has a solid executive team at the helm. However, for a decade-old company, itst financials look shaky. On top of that, it exists in a highly competitive industry with many recognizable names already occupying a massive share of the market. Altogether, PersonalRX is a Neutral Deal at this time.
For questions regarding the KingsCrowd staff pick or ratings for this company, please reach out to [email protected].
Analysis written by Ethan Thomas.
Company Funding & Growth
Funding history
Close Date | Platform | Valuation | Total Raised | Security Type | Status | Reg Type |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
10/22/2021 | Wefunder | $30,000,000 | $175,217 | SAFE | Funded | RegCF |
Founder Profile
PersonalRX Founder Lawrence Margolis on Improving Patients' Lives
Millions of Americans take multiple medications daily, and it's estimated that 42% of "adults over the age of 65 take five or more medications." Keeping track of all these medications, making sure to take them at the right times, and maintaining proper doses is a huge effort for many patients and/or their caregivers. PersonalRX wants to simplify the process.PersonalRX is a full-service delivery company for prescriptions. It synchs prescriptions so that a patient's refills all come at one time, and it packages each medication in individual dose packets that are labelled with the patient's name and when the drug should be taken. We sat down with founder and CEO Lawrence Margolis to learn more about how PersonalRX was formed and the market potential for the company.
Note: This interview was conducted over phone and email. It has been lightly edited for clarity and length.