Physician engagement startup Doceree closes seed funding round of $1M

Doceree Inc., the world’s first Programmatic Physician Engagement Platform, has raised $1 million in seed funding from a group of angel investors from India and the United States.

The New Jersey-based Doceree successfully secured the funds despite the unprecedented coronavirus crisis that is wreaking havoc on stocks worldwide, causing a meltdown in investment sentiment globally. The health-tech startup plans to utilize the funds for customer acquisition, recruiting talent, scaling up operations in India and the US, and ramping up the technology to further digitalize physician engagement experience.

The seed funding round was led by Kumar Gaurav, Founder & CEO of Beyond Codes in which other investors from the advertising and pharmaceutical industry participated. Doceree, which connects pharma brands and digital platforms and allows products and services of the former to be marketed to physicians on the latter’s platforms, has also inducted Rahul Gupta in the management board. Gupta is a serial investor in over 15 IT, ITES, Healthcare, and Real Estate sector businesses.

Founded in 2019, Doceree aims to address the problem of the rising cost of healthcare by bringing efficiency and effectiveness to physician engagement by using data and creativity in healthcare marketing. 

Dr. Harshit Jain, Founder and CEO, Doceree, said, “Doceree is playing a pivotal role in improving healthcare delivery and outcomes by building brand relationships with healthcare professionals (HCPs) and adding genuine and long-term value to them through data-driven endemic marketing.”

“In the healthcare space, there is huge data that lies underutilized which when used efficiently can drastically change the way physicians are engaged. The challenge is that despite changing dynamics and the surge of digitisation, it’s still hard for pharmaceutical brands to approach physicians on the digital medium. While pharma companies spend a huge amount to market physicians in the traditional way, they are not able to tap the vast potential of the digital medium to grow their businesses. That is the gap Doceree plugs by helping them make the most of the Digital Physician Ecosystem through its Programmatic Physician Engagement Platform,” he added.

The company witnessed a massive growth since its launch in the US, being able to create an expansive network of 1 million physicians there in an incredibly short span of time.  

After gaining a strong foothold in the US market, Doceree launched its India operations in mid-March this year, having advanced its entry to let pharmaceutical companies gain access to physicians amid coronavirus pandemic through its platform for free, in its bid to support them when their crucial workforce of medical and sales representatives are locked indoors.

Rahul Gupta stated, “Doceree’s concept of programmatic physician engagement is distinct, disruptive, and innovative. How it became a crucial tool for pharma companies to reach out to doctors during the ongoing COVID-19 crisis establishes the greater need and importance of the platform. The future of digital access to physicians is very promising and we truly believe in Doceree’s vision.”

The company replicated the huge response it received in the US in India as well, with the network of physicians here already growing to 300,000. A significant number of renowned pharma brands and digital platforms are already using the Doceree platform in both India and the US.

Powered by a unique Espyian AI engine, Doceree’s platform helps maximize HCP (healthcare professional) engagement for pharma brands and digital platforms. It brings demand-side and supply-side together for healthcare professional HCP (healthcare professional) messaging on a simple self-serve interface, helping brands harness the full potential of HCP engagement on standalone publisher platforms. The company also helps digital platforms make revenue through a partnership with it.

Doceree enables pharma companies to market to physicians using technology to automatically serve ads, reaching the right user with the right message at the right time, optimising efficiency i.e. clicks and conversions, reducing waste, and ensuring effective measurement of return on investment (RoI).