BERWYN, PA — AscellaHealth has launched AscellaOne, a technology-driven strategic enablement platform designed to modernize how health plans, employers, and pharmacy benefit managers administer and manage pharmacy benefits amid mounting cost and regulatory pressures.
The AscellaOne platform is positioned as an alternative to traditional national PBMs, offering similar economic scale and operational capabilities without adopting the PBM model itself. Built as a modular, interoperable ecosystem, the platform connects payers with vendor partners while emphasizing transparency, configurability, and data-driven decision-making—features increasingly demanded by employers and health plans.
The launch comes as the pharmacy benefit landscape faces accelerating disruption. High-cost specialty drugs continue to dominate spending growth, employers are voicing growing dissatisfaction with opaque pricing structures, and regulators are intensifying scrutiny of drug pricing and PBM practices. AscellaOne is designed to help organizations navigate these forces by enabling seamless collaboration, flexible benefit design, and improved access to actionable data.
Chief Executive Officer Dea Belazi said legacy models are struggling to keep pace with today’s challenges around affordability, access, and transparency. She described AscellaOne as a membership-based ecosystem that allows payers and partners to connect and transact through a modern technology framework built for current market realities.
A central focus of the platform is managing the rising impact of specialty medications. Industry forecasts suggest 50 to 55 new drugs will launch annually over the next five years, with roughly three-quarters classified as specialty therapies. These medications now account for more than half of total drug spending while representing a small fraction of overall prescription volume. AscellaOne aims to give payer organizations a single, integrated tool set to improve affordability, clinical oversight, and long-term access to these therapies.
Employer frustration with traditional pharmacy benefit arrangements is another driver behind the platform’s development. Pharmacy spending remains the fastest-growing component of health benefits, and surveys indicate many employers would reconsider their current plans following modest annual cost increases. By unifying best-in-class vendors within a single ecosystem, AscellaOne seeks to give regional health plans and mid-tier PBMs greater visibility and control over benefit design and cost management.
Regulatory pressure is also reshaping the market. More than 23 states have enacted drug transparency laws, and hundreds of PBM-related bills have been introduced nationwide. AscellaOne’s modular architecture is intended to help organizations adapt to evolving compliance requirements without being locked into rigid legacy systems or long-term contracts.
AscellaHealth said the platform is designed to support sustainable cost control while maintaining a patient-centric focus, allowing payers and employers to respond more effectively as market dynamics and policy expectations continue to shift.
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