What does Dallas Mavericks owner and billionaire Mark Cuban know about the prescription drug industry? Cuban is answering that question with the launch of the Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Company (MCCPDC), which seeks to offer generic prescriptions for low prices.
Cuban and his team have been developing the service since October of last year, the Wall Street Journal wrote. The pharmacy is fully registered and claims to have over a hundred generic drugs for lower prices.
In a statement by the MCCPDC, the company outlines some of their drugs that show a large price gap from the traditional name brand.
For example, the leukemia treatment Imatinib typically costs around $9,657 per month. However, Cuban’s pharmacy lists the drug at only $47 per month. There are multiple additional examples that show hundreds of dollars shaved off the price of several popular medications.
The MCCPDC states that they achieve these stunningly low prices by sourcing the drugs directly from the manufacturer.
The MCCPDC functions much more like a wholesale service, with their website and distribution being handled by the company TruePill. However, according to Forbes, the MCCPDC plans to build a drug manufacturing plant in Dallas in the near future.
Mark Cuban was inspired after an email from radiologist Alex Oshmyansky, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reports. Oshmyansky is now the CEO of MCCPDC. The company pledges to be “radically transparent” and is classified as a cash venture to bypass Pharmacy Benefit Managers, creating a true wholesale market for prescription drugs.
Oshmyansky states, “The markup on potentially lifesaving drugs that people depend on is a problem that can’t be ignored. It is imperative that we take action and help expand access to these medications for those who need them most.”
The MCCPDC markup will be 15% to keep operations running. This contrasts with some mainstream pharmaceutical companies, which the WSJ claims markup their products up by 1,000%.
