Kalderos has gained support for its audit platform ensuring prescription drug market stakeholders apply discounts appropriately.

Chicago-based health tech startup, Kalderos, announced last month that it had raised $7 million in new financing to promote market adoption of its first-to-market platform that introduces transparency to the prescription drug pricing process and monitors whether discount programs are being properly implemented.

The Series A round was funded by Mercato Partners, a Salt Lake City-based growth equity firm.

“Additional funding will not only fuel expansion plans, but also help us to deliver on our value proposition,” said Jeremy Docken, co-founder and CEO of Kalderos in a press release. “We found in Mercato a partner with the growth stage expertise to help us develop and fuel our go-to-market engine.”

In their recent report¹, the Government Accountability Office indicated that non-compliance with the 340B Discount Drug Program requirements is unmistakably evident in various sectors. Profits are being diverted from the program as many hospitals, clinics, and pharmacies are finding loopholes in the system that allow them to charge full price for pharmaceuticals, deny patients the discounts and pocket the savings.  According to industry estimates, billions of dollars are wasted in such non-compliant discount claims.

Docken, a CPA with expertise in both the Medicaid and 340B programs, along with fellow co-founders, Jim Bonkowski, CIO and David DeVogel, CTO, established Kalderos in 2016 to address this problem using a technological approach to reduce inefficiencies and non-compliance in the system in order to improve the circumstances for patients.

In a press release from the company, Kalderos characterizes its approach as a real-time, compliant, point-of-sale chargeback solution for the prescription drug market. Their SaaS platform identifies inconsistencies and non-compliance issues, many of which are errors that have previously gone undetected, that arise during the various financial exchanges between stakeholders.

As described on their website, the company combines industry expertise, artificial intelligence, and comprehensive, deep-data libraries, to simplify “the complex coordination of drug discount programs from exhaustive data services to intelligent reporting to issue resolution.” Ultimately, the right discounts are applied to the right transactions.

“We have to make certain that the infrastructure of health care is built in a way that all these discount programs we spend time creating work,” said Docken, in a recent press release. “With Kalderos, providers, payers and drug manufacturers can spend more time improving patients’ lives and less time on financial engineering.”

Joe Kaiser, Director at Mercato Partners added, “We believe Kalderos will restore transparency and trust, eliminate waste, and bring patients closer to the medicine they need at a price they can afford. We are excited to be with Kalderos on this journey, as they accelerate their progress using the remarkable traction they’ve already established. Jeremy and team will leverage the outstanding reputation for collaboration and innovation with ecosystem partners to deliver on their mission.”

The company indicated that it can already claim seven of the 15 largest drug manufacturers among its current customers.

Visit www.kalderos.com to learn more about this company.

1. References:

GAO-18-480, DRUG DISCOUNT PROGRAM: Federal Oversight of Compliance at 340B Contract Pharmacies Needs Improvement. 2018. https://www.gao.gov/assets/700/692697.pdf