Mark Cuban-Owned Company To Launch Pharmacy Benefit Management Services

Billionaire investor Mark Cuban is funding a new company focused on selling generic pharmaceuticals at a transparent fixed-rate markup.

What Happened: The Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Company is launching a new pharmacy-benefit management (PBM) service that will incorporate manufacturing, pharmacy services and wholesale distribution under one corporate operation, according to a Wall Street Journal report.

The company's manufacturing facility will be based in Dallas and is slated to be open by September 2022. Also in the works is an online pharmacy will sell 100 of the most commonly prescribed generic medications.

The pharmacy is buying drugs directly from generic manufacturers including Amneal Pharmaceuticals Inc. AMRX and will charge customers a 15% markup plus a $3 dispensing fee, said Alex Oshmyansky, the CEO of Cuban’s company.

On the wholesale side, Cuban’s PBM will start bidding for clients next year for its PBM services and aims to be operational in 2023, Oshmyansky added, noting the company will share details of its operating costs to clients and will share 100% of the rebates they receive from drugmakers.

“The supply chain for distributing pharmaceuticals to patients is so cumbersome and broken,” Oshmyansky said. “We decided the only way to get our drugs to the people who need them is to build a parallel supply chain where we have control of all the intermediary players and ensure the same level of transparency at every level.”

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Why It Happened: Cuban launched his drug company in January after being a longtime vocal critic of the high cost of health care, with an initial focus on the manufacture of albendazole, an antiparasitic drug. Oshmyansky was tapped by Cuban to run the PBM after he wrote an unsolicited pitch letter to the “Shark Tank” star three years ago.

“Our goal is that everyone should be able to afford their medicine,” said Cuban company’s website. “Everyone should know what it cost to make their medicine. Everyone should feel the price they paid for their medicine was fair.”

Photo: Gage Skidmore/Flickr Creative Commons.