The startup’s team is international, composed of 32 people, 20 of which are based in Italy: leading it is CEO Nicolò Petrone together with co-founders Mohamed Younes (COO) and Alberto Marchetti (CMO). Petrone is a young talent (born in 1993) with a solid background in corporate finance who already in the past has closed an exit deal with fintech platform Medici, acquired in March 2021 by unicorn Prove. His passion is building things and bringing world-changing products to market. He was recently included in Forbes’ “30 Under 30” list for Italy. And it is precisely with him that we wanted to exchange some impressions.
Can you give us a definition of 1000Farmacie?
“1000Farmacie is a startup, launched at the height of the pandemic in April 2020 and is a digital platform that brings together dozens of Italian pharmacies through integration with their management system, effectively becoming an online pharmacy with a wider assortment of products on the market. Our operating model is bi-directional: the relationship with both the pharmacy and the pharmaceutical company is fundamental.”
How did your insight arise?
“We were born as a result of the observation of 3 evidences within the online pharmaceutical market: first of all, among all product sectors, the online pharmaceutical one has the lowest 5% penetration rate but at the same time the highest growth rate. Secondly, considering the 200 thousand references on the market, finding all the products you are looking for in the same pharmacy is really complicated. Finally, the third and most significant is that the Italian pharmaceutical market is composed of 23,000 pharmacies but only 6 sell online.
What unites these three factors?
“Our proposal. We asked ourselves: why not create a technology that integrates all independent pharmacies and allows them to virtually move their stock on this platform? The “last mile”, the one that brings products to consumers’ homes, in Italy in medicines simply doesn’t exist: that’s our goal, and it’s worth so much.”A digital platform that brings together dozens of Italian pharmacies through integration with their management system, effectively becoming an online pharmacy with a wider assortment of products on the market.
What has been the feedback from pharmacies?
“The proximity network of pharmacies is the same as in the beginning, we often have contacts with pharmacies that are out of town, “rural”, that can not sell as much as they would like and consequently. to increase profits, they rely on us. Through our system, the turnovers of these pharmacies have risen even up to over 100,000 euros per month per pharmacy.”
Is the situation abroad different from the Italian one?
“Not very different. And in fact, all the European countries where there are a lot of pharmacies are very keen on adopting business styles similar to that of 1000Pharmacies, and there are already two or three such realities, for example, between France and Spain.”
A conditioning constraint is certainly represented by the doctor’s prescription, designed and created for the “physical” sale of the medicine. How do you manage this aspect?
“Our architecture requires that prescriptions are uploaded to the platform, then transferred to the pharmacy, which will prepare the product that will be sent to the final recipient. In Italy the prescriptions are obviously dematerialized but for example in Germany they are still paper-based. The pandemic has accelerated the trend of e-commerce and the propensity to digital both on the supply and demand sides, in any field, including medicines. The algorithm also allows us to give visibility to products for which a prescription is not necessary, but which integrate or are complementary to the necessary treatments for specific pathologies suffered by patients who turn to pharmacies. This organically expands the range of available offerings, with clear commercial benefits.”
Timeframe for implementation?
“Definitely by the end of the year.”