India’s healthcare delivery is catching up fast. DocPharma, a startup founded in 2023, is now promising to deliver prescription medicines in 30 minutes through its B2B2C infrastructure model—partnering with e-pharmacies, insurers, hospitals, and local stores. Operating in over a dozen cities, the company bridges the critical delay gap that often slows medicine delivery to two to three days. Its hybrid approach—mixing dark stores with retail pharmacy networks—helps ensure speed, inventory reliability, and operational scale. With gross merchandise value (GMV) growing sharply (≈462% year-over-year), DocPharma is aiming for further expansion into Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities, riding on India’s accelerating OPD insurance growth and the large under-served market for medicines. The startup is now raising Pre-Series A funds to scale operations. For founders and investors, it’s a case study in how supply-chain infrastructure plus aggregation can unlock margins and customer trust in low-margin sectors.
India has grown used to getting groceries in 10 minutes and meals in under half an hour—but getting prescription medicines still often takes a frustrating two to three days. That’s the gap DocPharma aims to close. The tech-healthcare startup, launched in early 2023 by Shashank Rai and Saquib Ali (later joined by CPTO Sagar Chauhan), offers rapid medicine delivery through a backend infrastructure model that connects pharmacies, insurers, e-pharmacies, hospitals, and health-tech platforms.
By operating in more than a dozen cities—including Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Kolkata, Pune, Chennai, Hyderabad, and Patna—DocPharma delivers prescriptions within 30-60 minutes via its partner-platforms. The startup mixes dark stores with traditional retail pharmacies to improve stock availability and speed. Its system routes orders based on SKU availability and proximity, dispatching delivery riders quickly to local stores.
The founders spotted the opportunity during India’s first COVID lockdown, when medicines were in short supply and delivery was unreliable. What started as pro bono medicine drops in a single apartment complex evolved into a data-driven business with thousands of SKUs and dozens of partner pharmacies.
One of DocPharma’s big challenges is working in a low-margin space: over 750,000 SKUs from 3,000+ manufacturers, high logistics costs, and thin profit per unit. Their solution has been aggregation—bringing together demand from multiple platforms (healthcare providers, e-pharmacies, insurers, wellness brands) to achieve scale in procurement, fulfilment, and inventory.
The rewards show up in key metrics: over 80% of orders fulfilled in under 60 minutes, strong repeat order behaviour from partner platforms, and increased utilisation of insurance for medicines. For example, its internal data suggests OPD insurance medicine claims have doubled (or more) in recent years thanks to their quicker fulfilment.
DocPharma’s growth has been rapid: GMV has surged by ~462% in FY25 over FY24. It projects monthly run-rate growth between 56% and 87% by the end of the current fiscal year. The Indian pharmaceutical market overall is forecast to reach USD 130 billion by 2030, up from about USD 50 billion currently. OPD insurance is expanding too, opening up lines of demand.
Looking ahead, DocPharma is raising a Pre-Series A round. The planned funding will be used to grow its network of pharmacy partners and dark stores—especially in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities—and deepen relationships with e-pharmacies, healthtech platforms, and wellness brands. For startup founders, entrepreneurs, and investors, DocPharma offers a blueprint for leveraging infrastructure and partnerships in sectors often considered slow, low-margin, and fragmented.
