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These days, former Apple and PepsiCo CEO John Sculley is being inspired by health care — and more specifically, pharmacy care.
Technology-led PBM RxAdvance last week announced Sculley as its chairman and chief marketing officer. The move expands his role at the company, where he’s a founding investor and had served as vice chairman.
John Sculley in a Money 20/20 interview with Forbes Media.
“Convincing John Sculley to join our management team was a great step forward toward positioning RxAdvance as one of the most transformative and innovative companies in health care,” according to RxAdvance founder and CEO Ravi Ika. “John Sculley has defined our vision at RxAdvance.”
A full-service PBM, RxAdvance delivers integrated pharmacy benefit management via its Collaborative PBM Cloud in three offerings: nirvanaRxCloud, a cloud-based solution designed to cut overall pharmacy costs; nirvanaAccountableCare, a risk-sharing solution to rein in avoidable, drug-impacted medical costs; and nirvanaSpecialty, designed to convert specialty drug management from “buy & bill” to “authorize & manage.”
“Great entrepreneurs start with a ‘noble cause.’ The more time I spend with Ravi, the more I appreciate that he has created something truly amazing,” Sculley commented. “After leaving Apple, I have acted as an advisor, investor and board member in over two dozen companies. RxAdvance is the first company that has inspired me to get involved as an operating partner.”
Companies that Sculley has advised span such sectors as health technology (RxAdvance, Rally Health, MD Live, FLEXPharma and SleepMed), financial technology (NEFT), mobile technology (MetroPCS and Obi Worldphone) and marketing technology ( Zeta Interactive).
RxAdvance sees the innovative application of technology as an answer to squelching medication-related health care costs. The company explains that these costs stem in large part from antiquated platforms, obsolete transactional methods, limited service offerings, a dearth of actionable intelligence, and the lack of one point of accountability in the care spectrum. As a result, RxAdvance contents that, if optimized correctly, savings from half of avoidable drug-impacted medical costs are more than enough to fund the uninsured and underinsured, in turn reducing health insurance premiums for all Americans.
RxAdvance pegs its addressable market at about $840 billion, encompassing not just the $370 billion PBM market space but also the $120 billion specialty drug market and $350 billion in avoidable medication-related health costs.
“Through the Collaborative PBM Cloud, our disruptive solutions reduce overall pharmacy costs, specialty costs and avoidable drug-impacted medical costs,” Ika stated. “John and I work together every day as partners. Our growth momentum is accelerating, and John’s thought leadership across three vectors — consumer, high-tech and health care — has helped us conceptualize and implement our differentiation.”
