Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Co. CEO Addresses Specialty Drug Cost Criticism

June 22

Alex Oshmyansky, M.D., the CEO of Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Co. (MCCPDC), the online cash pharmacy funded by the eponymous billionaire investor, said the company has become a licensed drug wholesaler nationwide and has plans to roll out quasi-PBM business lines including a retail pharmacy network. Oshmyansky discussed these new ventures — and addressed criticism by health care experts that his firm can’t lower specialty pharma costs — during a June 13 keynote at the 2023 AHIP Conference in Portland, Oregon.

“I think it was always our ambition” to work with retail pharmacies, Oshmyanksy said. “I think there’s a variety of products where it just doesn’t necessarily make sense for them to be mail-order products,” citing “cold supply chain” and “acute care medications” as examples.

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Radar on Drug Benefits

Peter Johnson

Peter has worked as a journalist since 2011 and has covered health care since 2020. At AIS Health, Peter covers trends in finance, business and policy that affect the health insurance and pharma sectors. For Health Plan Weekly, he covers all aspects of the U.S. health insurance sector, including employer-sponsored insurance, Medicaid managed care, Medicare Advantage and the Affordable Care Act individual marketplaces. In Radar on Drug Benefits, Peter covers the operations of (and conflicts between) pharmacy benefit managers and pharmaceutical manufacturers, with a particular focus on pricing dynamics and market access. Before joining AIS Health, Peter covered transportation, public safety and local government for various outlets in Seattle, his hometown and current place of residence. He graduated with a B.A. from Colby College.