What’s shaking up the future of the retail pharmacy

Hello,

Welcome to Insider Healthcare. I'm Lydia Ramsey Pflanzer, and this week in healthcare news:

• Blake Dodge's scoop on Amazon's bricks-and-mortar pharmacy ambitions shook up healthcare stocks;
• Dealmaking is heating up heading into the summer – for biotech and digital health;
• How Wall Street is betting on primary care companies.

If you're new to this newsletter, sign up here. Tips, comments? Email me at [email protected] or tweet @lydiaramsey125. Let's get to it…

First, I hope you all have a great, restful long weekend.

As you might expect, your next edition of this newsletter will hit your inbox on Tuesday. See you then!

A market-moving exclusive

On Wednesday, pharmacy stocks were rocked by Blake's reporting that Amazon is considering setting up physical pharmacies.

It's something that tends to happen every time news breaks about Amazon's pharmacy plans - most recently when the tech giant unveiled its Amazon Pharmacy brand in November.

The idea of going into bricks-and-mortar is still just that - an idea. There's no concrete plan yet, Blake reported.

My curiosity: Could Amazon pick up more of the future pharmacy market through a bricks-and-mortar presence?

I'd imagine it'll still take a lot to win over customers who've been going to pharmacy giants for years. How much better would the experience have to be?

Read the scoop here>>

Amazon is weighing a push into physical pharmacies to grab a bigger slice of the $370 billion prescription market

Gearing up for a dealmaking summer

For both digital health and biotech, it seems summer could be a big time for mergers and acquisitions.

This week, we got the scoop on another digital health deal - Grand Rounds and Doctor on Demand are buying Included Health, a startup that's taking a new approach to LGBTQ-friendly healthcare.

I'm curious to understand what's driving the "consolidation tsunami," as we're calling it. Is there pressure for digital health companies to do it all? Or is it all about sustaining growth? Send me your thoughts at [email protected].

Meanwhile, Allison DeAngelis reports that biotech M&A is set to heat up in the next few months.

She outlined the 22 biotechs most likely to be bought, according to analysts at Jefferies.

See the full list>>

Top biotech analysts say M&A is set to heat up this summer. Here are the 22 drug companies that are likely to get bought.

How founders raise millions

This week, Megan Hernbroth got her hands on a pair of pitch decks that highlight a fascinating expansion of the direct-to-consumer healthcare market.

Brightside, a mental health startup that uses therapy and medication to treat conditions like anxiety and depression raised $24 million, the company said Thursday.

See the presentation it used to raise its latest round>>

And Clearing is trying to make chronic pain management more accessible by going directly to consumers.

It's been a few years since companies originally started shipping dermatology formulations and prescriptions hair loss treatment straight to patients' doors using virtual care and online pharmacies. Now it seems that startups are going after trickier conditions to treat.

My big question now: Where will the line be? Can everything be done in a direct-to-consumer way?

Take a look>>

See the presentation a serial entrepreneur used to raise $20 million from Bessemer and Founders Fund for his solution for Americans living with chronic pain

Wall Street's take on primary care

There's now a crop of publicly-traded companies focused on primary care, and it's interesting to see where Wall Street thinks they're headed.

Analysts for instance think One Medical is poised for a comeback, Patricia Kelly Yeo reports. That's despite the company posting losses in the first quarter that were twice as much as expected.

Meanwhile, Wall Street's betting big on companies like Privia and Agilon Health.

These are companies that instead of owning primary care practices work with them to change how the practices are paid.

The companies' term for what they're doing is "physician-enablement."

Get the full breakdown>>

Why Wall Street is betting on a couple of under-the-radar companies that want to transform how primary-care practices get paid

More stories we covered this week:

• Moderna says its coronavirus vaccine is effective in teens, Andrew Dunn reports. The biotech plans to apply in early June for an expanded OK.
• Home-care companies are pulling out all the stops to recruit more workers, Kelly reports. That includes gas cards, company cars, and guarantees of full-time work.
• Allison had the scoop on prescription video-game startup Akili raising a fresh $160 million.

- Lydia