3 Health Systems Invest In Supply Chain Startup

This week, three health systems invested in a New York City-based startup on a mission to transform hospital supply chain operations.

Clarium, founded in 2020, closed a $10.5 million financing round on Tuesday, bringing its total funding to date to $16 million. The round was led by General Catalyst and included three health system venture capital arms — those of Kaiser Permanente, Yale New Haven Health and Texas Medical Center.

The startup’s technology seeks to increase visibility, collaboration and trust within the hospital supply chain, said CEO Steve Liou.

“Healthcare supply chain data is scattered across multiple systems belonging to providers, suppliers and information brokers. This fragmentation makes it difficult for any single party to have comprehensive visibility into the entire supply chain,” he declared.

Clarium’s chief product, called Astra OS, gathers information from various sources in the healthcare supply chain, including data from hospitals, medical suppliers and information exchanges, Liou explained. Astra OS then takes this information and translates it into a common format.

Once the data is in a standardized format, Astra OS uses AI to analyze it — and later categorize items, identify patterns and deliver insights, Liou added.

“In essence, Astra OS acts like a universal translator and analyst for healthcare supply chain data, turning complex, scattered information into clear, actionable insights for our users,” he remarked.

For example, Clarium’s system can identify which unfilled orders are most critical, using data on factors like usage rates, current stock levels and supplier inventory. It can also suggest potential substitutes and recommend optimal inventory levels for each item at different locations, Liou explained.

Maintaining up-to-date physician preference cards is another ongoing challenge for health systems, he noted. Preference cards often become outdated as physicians frequently change their practices — he pointed out that this leads to waste because unnecessary items are opened for procedures and subsequently discarded.

Additionally, hospitals often struggle to standardize items across physicians who perform similar procedures due to a lack of data-driven insights, Liou said. He argued that Clarium addresses these issues by having features that use data to standardize preference cards at a procedure level.

“By analyzing a physician’s historical usage patterns, Astra OS can suggest what items should be included on their preference card for different procedures. This helps reduce waste and ensures that the right supplies are available for each procedure,” Liou declared.

He pointed out that several health systems provided input into the features of Astra OS, including Yale New Haven Health, Geisinger Health and Boston Children’s Hospital.

To Liou, some of his startup’s main competitors are supply chain platform Surgence, various supply chain solutions developed by various consulting firms, and home-grown tools created by health systems. He also noted that PrefConnect and PrefTech could be considered competitors in the preference card management space.

Clarium sets itself apart from the competition due to its network scale and reach, Liou argued.

“We’ve built a significantly larger data network compared to our competitors. This extensive reach allows us to gather more data signals and generate more comprehensive insights,” he stated. “Our large network creates powerful network effects. As more healthcare providers join our platform, the quality and breadth of our data and insights improve, benefiting all users.”

He also highlighted the comprehensiveness of Clarium’s platform as another differentiator. While many companies focus on a single aspect of operations, Astra OS addresses multiple challenges, from supply chain disruptions to preference card management, he remarked.

Photo: Pixtum, Getty Images