SkyCell secures $116M for medical supply chain management

SkyCell, the Swiss-based pharmatech company, has closed its $116M Series D. The investment will be used to expand SkyCell’s global footprint with a key focus on growth across the US and Asia.

SkyCell protects the pharmaceutical supply chain through a combination of IP protected temperature controlled containers, software and big data analytics. Every month SkyCell containers are used to protect more than  US$2.5bn of pharma goods, including hundreds of millions doses of vaccines, cancer treatments, diabetes care and diagnostic solutions for patients around the world.

Its platform SkyMind streamlines shipment and asset management through automation and real-time visibility using 3 key factors: risk, cost and CO2. The DECARBONIZE tool is part of the software suite, enabling clients to predict, track and report CO2 emissions as well as optimize routes to minimize their carbon footprint. 

Richard Ettl, co-founder and CEO of SkyCell, said: “It is such an exciting time to be a technology provider to the pharma industry as the sector experiences fast growth from new, blockbuster biologics coming to market. At the same time, the industry has recognized the need to decarbonize the supply chain, as more than 70% of pharma is shipped in a one-way solution, which will shortly see fees introduced for disposal.

"Our reusable 1500X container saves on average 50% CO2 or in absolute terms 8 tons CO2e per use. This means for a typical pharma customer today we save more than 250 '000 tons of CO2 every year without compromising quality. And finally, digitalization is coming to pharma supply chains – moving away from manual worksheets to integrated workflows that leverage S+O data (simulated and operational data) from our proprietary pool of billions of data points. Combined with the power of AI, this enables significant reductions in both cost and risk for our customers. With this new investment, we can further optimize supply chains and create truly sustainable logistics.”

Bosun Hau, Managing Director and Head of Private Equity at Tybourne Capital Management said: “I am delighted to join SkyCell’s board at this seminal moment in the Company’s growth. With its lead in hardware as well as software and tracking platform offering, SkyCell is well positioned to become the technology partner of choice to the global pharmaceutical industry well beyond its current cold-chain logistics business.

"Global supply chains are becoming increasingly complex and managing risk is a board level issue for nearly every sector - for pharmaceutical companies, in particular, it is mission critical for getting life-saving medications into the hands of patients. SkyCell has developed a comprehensive state of the art system combining hardware, software and big data analytics that is transforming a pharmaceutical logistics industry that has seen little innovation over the past several decades.”