Even as the sub-committee formed by the government is yet to finalise regulations for online pharmacies, the PM Health & Life Care (PMHLC) has officially gone online with its managed marketplace health exchange integrated Zigy.com to connect chemists and druggists with consumers. Though there is no clear-cut central regulation for online pharmacies, PMHLC says it is fully compliant with the Information Technology and Drugs & Cosmetics Act.

The service is launched in New Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Chennai and Bengaluru. PMHLC is eyeing one million transactions a year. The seamless health exchange can connect not just pharmacies, but allopathy, ayurveda, homoeopathy doctors, clinics, hospitals, diagnostic labs and insurance firms, the company said.

“We are an enabler to fulfil the technology intermediary obligations for chemists and druggists by adhering to guidelines of both the IT ad D&C Act. Zigy.com is a platform connecting chemists and druggists having a valid license, a qualified pharmacist at the counter with a reputation in high quality inventory and required infrastructure. Therefore, we believe, we are compliant primarily because we have followed all norms of the D&C Act pertaining to prescription sale prescribed only by registered medical practitioners. Therefore, regulators will have every reason to be content with our sound technology and high quality driven practices. Our effort is to bring about a dramatic change in the Indian healthcare sector on lines of the IT industry,” said Phaneesh Murthy, co-founder, and chairman, PMHLC.

Zigy.com will expand within six months to 18 cities, to 30 locations in a year and 50 towns in 18 months. The company says it has now selected around 50 chemists, who are looking to maximise the use of technology, after stringent screening. Ten registered pharmacists man its command centre in Bengaluru to verify purchase orders in keeping with the Drugs and Cosmetics Act. There will be no drug substitute, discounts or deals. Medicines will be sold only on a valid prescription by a registered medical practitioner. The prescription is first scanned and the original submitted for verification when drugs are delivered.

“We have maximised use of algorithms to create foolproof security codes to nab violators and dismiss them from their exchange. The platform is also integrated with Zigy Health Vault, which is a patient controlled electronic health record system that provides portability and convenience to access medicines and disease database. In fact, this is our contribution to the Union government’s Swastha Bharat initiative,” he added.

We also intends to map disease specific areas in cities which indicate high prevalence of certain health disorders like respiratory and cancer besides enable patient support groups, said Murthy.

PMHLC has invested $5 million and is looking to raise $10-12 million via Series A funding before the year end.

“It is high time Indians take advantage of the growing e-commerce trend in medicine purchase too. We are confident of our adherence to D&C Act going by our focus on selection of chemists with close monitoring on their methods of dispensing, storage, transportation and drug quality,” said Hemant Bhardwaj, co-founder & CEO, PMHLC.

The company also hired a leading manpower recruitment agency dedicated to e-commerce to impart the delivery skills. It is also scouting for D Pharm candidates as each city will need 10 such candidates for drug delivery, said Bhardwaj.