[Funding alert] Pharmacy chain Generico raises venture debt to triple its store-count by 2021

Generico has secured $1.39 million in Series A from venture debt fund Alteria Capital. This investment is part of Alteria’s venture debt fund of $134 million, which got its final close in July 2019.

With the latest fundraise, Generico is looking at strengthening its supply chain, technology and healthcare prepositions.

Vinod Murali, Managing Partner at Alteria Capital, said, “Generico is building a strong network of omnichannel healthcare delivery with pharmacies as the starting point.”

“Gadia and the team at Generico have been working hard in creating a brand which has the potential to become a surrogate for trust and efficient patient care which can then be extended to other adjacent opportunities as well,” he added.

In September last year, the pharmacy chain secured $11 million in Series A from Lightbox. This marked the investment company’s foray into the healthcare segment. Additionally, this round has also seen participation from Tomorrow Capital, Whiteboard Capital, and angel investor Gagan Goyal in December 2018. The company has so far secured $15.39 million in Series A round.

Generico was founded by Siddharth Gadia and Girish Agarwal in 2017. The Mumbai-based firm is a specialised pharmacy retail chain of generic medicines that are more affordable than brand-name medicines.

Future Plans

Currently, Generico has 49 stores. The pharmacy chain aims to have 150 stores in Mumbai and other cities like Pune by 2021. Apart from this, the company also looks to diversify disease management that will have a deeper impact on the lives of consumers with chronic diseases.

Girish Agarwal, Founder of Generico, said, “For chronic patients just popping pills is not going to solve problems, there needs to be an intervention in their disease journey to be able to take control of their conditions. We’ll be coming out with a very impactful and disease management solution.”

Going forward, Generico is also aiming to venture into e-pharmacies.

“We believe that there is a set of customers, who prefer convenience. Yes, the pharmacy is going to be an omnichannel place. We’ll definitely have an online portal as well,” Agarwal further stated.