Publication by Pittsburgh Business Times
A Cranberry Township-based integrated supply chain company, created by UPMC, has raised $2 million and tagged the capital to ramp up staff by 40 percent.
"Prodigo Solutions is adding 20 over the next 12 to 18 months," said Joe Mayernik, executive chairman.
The money will also be put toward escalating product development and expanding space. Prodigo presently occupies 17,000 square feet at Cranberry Woods Drive in Cranberry.
“We probably need 30 percent to 50 percent more space,” Mayernik said.
The money came from UPMC and Alliance Healthcare Partners, a Scottsdale, Ariz.-based private equity firm that took a 51 percent stake in Prodigo three years ago, investing $12.5 million at the time. It has increased its ownership position since, but the percentage has not been disclosed. It was the second capital raise this year for Prodigo, which closed on $5 million in February.
“What’s happened is our client base has grown; we now represent half of the nation’s top hospitals as defined by the ‘U.S. News & World Report Honor Roll’, and we’re expanding our footprint,” said Mayernik, a Pittsburgh native and Alliance partner.
In 2014, Prodigo employed 17 and occupied 6,000 square feet. Staff now tops 50.
“We’re really pleased with the talent in Pittsburgh and haven’t had to hire from outside the region,” Mayernik said.
Prodigo, which launched in 2009, enables hospitals to control spending on supplies through contract automation for acute-care hospitals and their extended care networks. Customers include the Cleveland Clinic.
Prodigo has released three new products in the last year aimed at increasing risk management efficiencies. The industry trade publication “Healthcare Matters” described its app, ProdigoMarketplace, as a “tour de force ... that provides an Amazon-like shopping experience.”
Alliance has been able to grow Prodigo in ways UPMC, as sole owner, could not, Mayernik said, because of the competitive factor when reaching out to other health care systems. “You don’t like to think the other guy is smarter than you and he’s created something,” Mayernik said.
But the partnership between Alliance and UPMC is extremely successful, he stressed, providing Prodigo a unique advantage by building products inside a health care environment with UPMC serving as a laboratory.
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