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Even U.S. presidents failed to fix this, but he's solving it | MedMe Health, Purya Sarmadi

This Founder pivoted four times before it worked, and says every pivot only made his conviction stronger. Purya Sarmadi, co-founder and CEO of MedMe Health, the Y Combinator startup now powering over 4,500 pharmacies across North America. In this conversation, Purya breaks down the distinction most first-time founders miss: being on the wrong wedge is not the same as being in the wrong market. He walks through the four pivots that got MedMe to its wedge, the one-line test he used to know he'd found it, and how COVID took the company from roughly 100 pharmacies to nearly 1,200 in about ten weeks. He also gets honest about the co-founder relationship, the message that nearly broke his, and the principle he now uses to keep both founders in the fight. What you'll learn: - The difference between being on the wrong wedge and being in the wrong market, and how to tell which one you're in - The one-line test he used to know he'd found the right wedge - Why AI changes the class of problems you can solve, but not your customer's job to be done - The exact co-founder message he regrets, and the "candle" principle he uses instead - How one 72-hour build won MedMe its first enterprise customer and unlocked the rest 00:00 Intro 01:27 You Can Be Right But Still Fail - Don't Give Up 04:11 Why couldn't a pharmacy do this? 04:53 The Pivots 05:42 Wrong wedge vs. wrong market 07:04 From 100 to nearly 1,200 pharmacies in ten weeks 08:04 Build on What Tech Can't Replace 10:06 What AI changes for founders, and what it doesn't 10:32 Comfort Quietly Kills Your Best Partnership 11:16 The message that nearly broke his co-founder 12:23 The candle principle EO stands for Entrepreneur& Opportunities. As we're looking to feature more inspiring stories of entrepreneurs all over the world, don't hesitate to contact us at partner@eoeoeo.net LinkedIn | @EO STUDIO X | @eostudi0 instagram | @eostudio.official

Purya Sarmadiguest
Jul 2, 202614mWatch on YouTube ↗

At a glance

WHAT IT’S REALLY ABOUT

MedMe’s pivots turned pharmacies into scalable community healthcare hubs

  1. MedMe iterated through four pivots, learning that being wrong about the initial product “wedge” doesn’t mean the overall healthcare market thesis is wrong.
  2. The company’s breakthrough came from identifying an underserved pharmacy workflow where customers would consolidate tools and feel immediate pain if MedMe disappeared.
  3. COVID validated the thesis that pharmacies could deliver clinical services at scale, driving MedMe’s growth from ~100 to nearly 1,200 pharmacies in about 2.5 months.
  4. Sarmadi argues pharmacies will thrive by leaning into clinical, relationship-based care that tech can’t replace, while software automates operations and enables new services.
  5. He highlights co-founder health as existential: defeatist criticism can break trust, while the “candle principle” frames a founder’s job as keeping each other’s motivation lit through volatility.

IDEAS WORTH REMEMBERING

5 ideas

Don’t confuse a bad wedge with a bad market.

Sarmadi kept conviction in healthcare while repeatedly changing the entry point (product focus). The pivots weren’t wasted—they created a growing dataset of customer insight that narrowed the best wedge.

A strong wedge is proven by dependency, not compliments.

The signal MedMe looked for was: if the product disappears tomorrow, the customer’s day gets worse. One pharmacy canceling multiple subscriptions to rely solely on MedMe was a decisive validation.

Pharmacies can become clinical hubs because access is already solved.

With most people living near a pharmacy, the bottleneck is not location but capacity and workflow. Software that enables consultative services (vaccines, testing, monitoring) unlocks that latent infrastructure.

Timing plus readiness can create step-function growth.

COVID forced pharmacies to deliver physical clinical services, matching MedMe’s direction and accelerating adoption from ~100 to ~1,200 pharmacies in a short window. The lesson is to build toward a thesis that external shocks can validate.

Compete where technology can’t fully substitute: trusted longitudinal care.

Online pharmacies may win on logistics and unit economics, but relationship-based guidance—knowing a patient’s history, preferences, and context—remains difficult to replace. MedMe positions tech as an enabler of that human advantage.

WORDS WORTH SAVING

5 quotes

If you have conviction around the market, don't give up on the market.

— Purya Sarmadi

Like, if you're a first-time founder, don't mistake being in the wrong wedge as being in the wrong market.

— Purya Sarmadi

If you were to say, "Hey, we won't exist tomorrow," and they would say, "Well, if you don't exist tomorrow, my life will be worse," then you knew that you have the right wedge.

— Purya Sarmadi

Literally in a two-and-a-half month period, we went from near 100 pharmacies to almost 1,200 pharmacies.

— Purya Sarmadi

As a good co-founder, one of your main responsibilities is to make sure both yours and your co-founder's candle stays alight.

— Purya Sarmadi

Founder mission rooted in family healthcare experiencePharmacies as underutilized access points (95% within five miles)Pivot strategy: wedge vs. market fitFrom OCR idea to hardware to clinical-care enablement softwareCOVID-driven distribution and enterprise credibilityPharmacy industry disruption: online pharmacies, shrinking margins, primary-care shortageAI’s role: new solution space, same customer jobs-to-be-doneCo-founder conflict, trust, and the “candle principle”

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