Somatus Raises $11 Million in Series B Financing
Innovative Kidney Care Company works with Health Systems and Payers to enable value-based care for CKD and ESRD populations
Apr 11, 2018, 06:00 ET
VIENNA, Va., April 11, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- Somatus, an innovative care delivery and management company delivering Kidney Care solutions to Health System and Payer customers, today announced it has secured $11 million in Series B funding in a round led by Flare Capital Partners and joined by BlueCross BlueShield Venture Partners, Inova Health System, and a new innovation firm founded by Andy Slavitt.
Founded in 2016, Somatus was created to address the needs of the 30 million individuals in the U.S. living with Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD) and End Stage Renal Disease (ESRD). By focusing on value-based solutions, Somatus provides longitudinal dialysis and care management services to patients on behalf of its Health System and Payer customers. As a new entrant in a highly consolidated Kidney Care market, Somatus has gained traction by working closely with its enterprise customers to design population health strategies focused on mobilizing disparate community-based care teams, prioritizing lower cost home-based therapies, and managing total cost of care for kidney care populations.
"Kidney disease is one of the most complicated illnesses to manage given its multiple co-morbidities and specialist providers," stated Dr. Ikenna Okezie, Co-Founder and CEO of Somatus. "The traditional 'fee for service' care models which predominate in kidney care have underperformed due to a lack of active care coordination and incentive alignment between service providers and payers of record. Somatus was created to provide a better model of care for these patients by delivering world class patient-centered care, streamlining care integration for health system partners, and optimizing cost performance for payers."
Somatus was founded by a team of world class healthcare operators, successful entrepreneurs and leading clinicians in the kidney disease management space. The Company is led by CEO, Dr. Ikenna Okezie, who most recently served as a Group Vice President at DaVita, and previously served in management roles at the Advisory Board Company and McKinsey and Co. Tony Welters, who serves as Chairman and Co-Founder of Somatus, most recently spent 12 years as EVP of UnitedHealth Group's Public and Senior Markets Group. Welters joined UNH in 2002 through UNH's acquisition of AmeriChoice, a Managed Medicaid plan founded in 1989, led by Welters as CEO until the UNH acquisition. Dr. Ramon Mendez serves as VP Medical Affairs, and is a nationally renowned and board-certified nephrologist whose work has centered around the delaying of the progression of CKD/ESRD.
"The opportunity to build a market-leading, value-based kidney care company, in partnership with local health systems and payers, is compelling," said Dan Gebremedhin, Principal at Flare Capital Partners. "The Kidney Care market is fraught with legacy players who have created misaligned incentives and have delivered poor outcomes to entire patient populations while driving up costs for payers. We are excited to partner with the Somatus team to build a technologically driven company focused on improving clinical and cost outcomes for this complex population."
"We see Somatus as key to our strategy of better managing our patients afflicted with CKD and ESRD," said Jim Santry, CEO, Direct to Consumer, Ambulatory, and Global Services at Inova Health System. "Through the Somatus platform, we can provide comprehensive, longitudinal care to our kidney care patients while tracking and optimizing total cost of care. Somatus is essential to our ability to manage this high-risk population and succeed in value-based contracts with payers."
"If wealthy people were the ones primarily on dialysis, it would have evolved years ago into a more humane and higher quality way of caring for people with chronic kidney disease. Instead we have spent decades and hundreds of billions of dollars on an antiquated care system," said Andy Slavitt, former Acting Administrator of CMS and Board member and investor at Somatus. "Somatus aims to change all of this one patient at a time, one population at a time, and one innovation at a time. These are the types of entrepreneurs we all need to make successful."
With this additional funding, the company will extend the capabilities of its technology and service platform, as well as fund the company's expansion into additional markets.
About Somatus
Somatus is a vertically integrated provider of value-based Kidney Care solutions for Health Systems and Payers. Somatus was founded by a team of world class healthcare operators, successful entrepreneurs and leading clinicians in the kidney disease management space. The Company is led by CEO and Co-Founder, Dr. Ikenna Okezie, who most recently served as a Group Vice President at DaVita, and previously served in management roles at the Advisory Board Company and McKinsey and Co. Tony Welters, who serves as Chairman and Co-Founder of Somatus, most recently spent 12 years as EVP of UnitedHealth Group's Public and Senior Markets Group. Welters joined UNH in 2002 through UNH's acquisition of AmeriChoice, a Managed Medicaid plan founded in 1989, led by Welters as CEO until the UNH acquisition. Dr. Ramon Mendez serves as VP Medical Affairs, and is a nationally renowned and board-certified nephrologist whose work has centered around the delaying of the progression of CKD/ESRD.
About Flare Capital Partners
Flare Capital is a team of proven healthcare technology venture capital investors known for its unparalleled strategic industry resources, insight and total commitment to the success of its entrepreneurs. Flare Capital raised one of the healthcare industry's largest dedicated venture capital funds focused exclusively on early stage and emerging growth investments in healthcare technology innovation and is privileged to closely partner with founders and management. Investments include Aetion, Bright Health, Circulation, ClearDATA, Curisium, HealthReveal, HealthVerity, Iora Health, Somatus, Valence Health (Evolent Health), VisitPay and Welltok. Learn more about Flare Capital Partners at www.flarecapital.com.
SOURCE Somatus