SMS-based pharmaceutical authentication service Sproxil has signed a deal with Indian telecommunications company Bharti Airtel for the latter to offer its subscribers in 17 African countries free texting for drug verification.
"Our goal is to bring affordable and easily accessible health services to over 450 million people," Andre Beyers, Airtel's chief marketing officer for Africa, says in a...
HealthTech Capital's Don Ross
PharmaSecure announced a $200,000 new round of funding led by HealtTech Capital, a Silicon Valley-based angel investing group. The second round included Gray Ghost Ventures and other undisclosed investors.
PharmaSecure uses SMS to verify a prescription drug's authenticity, using a unique code and phone number printed on a pill bottle's label. One of the startup's...
In the short three months since 2011 began already investors have announced or disclosed to the SEC nine investments in various mobile and wireless health startups. More than a year ago we tallied up the 15 venture capital deals announced during all of 2009. Clearly investment in mobile health and interest has come a long way since then -- this year also saw the planned launch of Rock Health Fund...
GlaxoSmithKline has teamed up with Sproxil to use its Mobile Product Authentication (MPA) codes, which is a text messaged based drug verification system, in Nigeria, according to a report from SecuringPharma.com. GSK is reportedly using the system for its widely-used antibiotic product, Ampiclox 500mg, which sells about 2 million units in the country each year. This is the first foray into SMS-...
Sorry, the iPhone isn't revolutionizing medicine... yet: A Business Insider commentary piece argues that the real future growth will be in physician centered apps for both the iPad and iPhone. The report includes interviews with McKinsey & Co. as well as an academic at Columbia University. Memorable quote: "But for now, the most widely used health apps are 'faddy' wellness apps, according to...
Last year the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime estimated that the global trade in fake pharmaceuticals would top $75 billion by the end of 2010, marking a 90 percent increase since 2005. Nigeria-based Sproxil, which was founded in 2005, uses scratch off codes and text messages to help consumers authenticate medications using the same process many use to add airtime minutes to their...
