The French healthcare software developer plans to bring its capabilities to UK general practices, with a focus on practical, proven use cases. 

France’s Doctolib has acquired London-based Medicus, as it says, to accelerate the transformation of general practices in the UK, with a clear ambition: bring the best technology, AI and services to the clinical and administrative teams of GP practices across the country. 

Although financial terms have not been disclosed, Doctolib has said that it intends to invest more than £100 million in the UK over the coming years, hire 150 people and establish a full r&d centre in London to drive innovation in primary care.

“This is an important step for Medicus, for the GP practices we support and for the future of primary care in the UK,” said Emile Axelrad, founder and chief executive of Medicus. 

“By joining forces with Doctolib, we will strengthen the platform, accelerate innovation and give practices access to even greater product and service capabilities, while preserving the quality, proximity and understanding they already value from our team,” he added. 

Health integration

Medicus will continue to operate with the same chief executive and founder and its UK-based team. Together, as one British team, in a press release, they said that they will invest significantly in developing their products to serve GP practices, PCNs and ICBs across the UK.

Doctolib has developed software that helps healthcare professionals spend less time on administration and more time with patients. With reinforced r&d teams based in London, Doctolib said that it will bring these capabilities to UK general practices, with a focus on practical, proven use cases: documentation support, workflow automation and smarter clinical and administrative assistance for GP teams.

Medicus is one of the most important recent innovations in UK primary care, having introduced the first new GP clinical software system in the NHS in 25 years. Developed through NHS England’s Tech Innovation Framework, the platform is designed to meet national requirements and integrate with key health systems, including the NHS App.

Patient data will continue to be processed securely, in compliance with UK GDPR and applicable NHS requirements, and hosted in the UK on secure, compliant infrastructure, as is already the case for Medicus today.