Thought Leaders in E-Commerce: Talha Sattar, CEO of NimbleRx (Part 1)

Talha talks about trends and opportunities in pharmacy e-commerce.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start by introducing our audience to yourself as well as to NimbleRx.

Talha Sattar: I’m from Pakistan. I’ve been in the US for 10 years. I run a company called NimbleRx. Our company enables online commerce and delivery for pharmacies around the country.

The company is about 4.5 years old and based in the Bay Area. A few years ago, we were in YCombinator. Today we work with close to a thousand pharmacies around the country and are doing roughly $200 million in revenue.

Sramana Mitra: Talk to me a bit about the trends. What’s happening in the pharmacy space? What innovation do you bring to the industry?

Talha Sattar: I’ll start with a macro trend in technology and commerce, which is convenience. Given the primary trend of getting things more conveniently, a lot of it ends up in how you deliver things to consumers that’s easier, faster, and cheaper.

A few years ago, it became obvious that pharmacy was going there. Consumers were used to buying everything else online. People who are in their 30’s, 40’s, and 50’s have been buying things online for the last 20 years. Now they want to buy prescriptions online. That’s the driving force for the consumers. The consumer wants convenience.

It’s the second biggest category in America after groceries. It’s a $500 billion market. It’s a massive market. That’s the trend that’s driving 60,000 offline pharmacies into a world that’s new and online. 

Sramana Mitra: Within that, what is special about you?

Talha Sattar: The pharmacy industry in America is largely two big structures. One is the CVS and Walgreens of the world that can afford to make investments in e-commerce and moving consumers online. Then there’s the 60% of the market that isn’t Walgreens and CVS.

What we do is help these pharmacies. We are building an online version of every pharmacy in every neighborhood in the country. Today, those don’t include CVS and Walgreens. We are going after 40,000 pharmacies in America that need a solution to match what the consumer wants.

Sramana Mitra: What is the backend? Is it a white-label solution that you have on the cloud that pharmacies can stick their brand on?

Talha Sattar: No, it’s not a white-labelled solution. We think about it as a marketplace dynamic where you can use our app. Either it’s a pharmacy you purchase from or maybe you’re looking for a pharmacy that delivers. Consumers find the pharmacy that they like.

We become the consumer layer. The consumer uses the pharmacy for dispensing their prescription, but they use NimbleRx to also buy OTC medications or search for other price opportunities that they might have. They might be able to get a drug cheaper. It’s very much focused around what the consumer wants.

We do have very tight partnerships with pharmacies which is what enables us to bring the service to the consumer. 

This segment is part 1 in the series : Thought Leaders in E-Commerce: Talha Sattar, CEO of NimbleRx
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