SnapMD has raised more than $3.2 million in an extension of its Series A round, about one year after raising $5.3 million in the first close for the round, according to a company news release. In an interview with CEO Dave Skibinski, during the JP Morgan Healthcare conference, he referenced Malcolm Gladwell.
“I believe this will be a tipping point year for telemedicine,” Skibinski said. “The number of RFPs has grown significantly. The nature of requirements has become far more well defined. Health systems and outpatient care have seen what early iterations of telemedicine have been and are now prepared to offer it themselves.”
One milestone SnapMD achieved in 2016 was it documented more than 40 different use cases for its platform.
The telemedicine technology company has raised $9.1 million to date as part of its larger goal to support the creation of standalone clinics in virtual environments. Shea Ventures, TYLT Labs and Whittier Ventures are among SnapMD’s investors in the Series A.
Skibinski said the company’s priorities for the funding injection are to continue to innovate, foster partnerships that deepen data and platform integration and to drive sales and commercial activity through channel partners such as Konica Minolta and athenahealth’s More Disruption Please marketplace.
In April last year, SnapMD inked a strategic partnership with Konica Minolta’s Business Innovation Center to support its concept for a digital health ecosystem. Skibinski said that since then, the collaboration has moved beyond the pilot stage and the company spent much of 2016 training Konica Minolta’s U.S. based sales teams. He noted that Konica Minolta began selling its virtual care management solution powered by SnapMD in December.
A Deep-dive Into Specialty Pharma
A specialty drug is a class of prescription medications used to treat complex, chronic or rare medical conditions. Although this classification was originally intended to define the treatment of rare, also termed “orphan” diseases, affecting fewer than 200,000 people in the US, more recently, specialty drugs have emerged as the cornerstone of treatment for chronic and complex diseases such as cancer, autoimmune conditions, diabetes, hepatitis C, and HIV/AIDS.
Last month, SnapMD joined cloud-based health IT vendor athenahealth’s More Disruption Please marketplace, a collection of apps, products, and services offered to physician practices, accountable care organizations and other healthcare facilities.
As the company seeks to add more innovative technologies to its platform, Skibinski noted that it is currently in talks with lab service company Iggby, which provides a phlebotomist-on-demand service. He likened what the company does to a digital version of what the commercial life industry has been doing for years.
“The ability for the physician to order a lab study while they are online in a virtual visit with the patient will become a reality this year” for its telemedicine platform, Skibinski predicted.
Photo: Hong Li, Getty Images
