GLASGOW, Scotland--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jun 24, 2025--
Simple Online Healthcare has launched in Denmark after tripling its revenue. Headquartered in Glasgow, Simple Online is one of the UK’s fastest-growing healthcare groups, offering scalable, regulated digital clinics across the UK, Germany, and Australia. In the UK, it operates as Simple Online Pharmacy.
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Led by CEO and Co-founder Addy Mohammed, Simple Online Healthcare reported revenue of £66 million in the year to 28th February 2025 [2024: £20.6m], and marked its 10-year anniversary in April with record monthly revenue of £10 million.
Addy Mohammed said: “We’re proud of how far we’ve come in our first ten years, and we think it’s notable that we’ve remained fully self-funded during that time. Denmark represents our third international market, and we are planning further expansion over the next twelve months.”
CFO Michael Hope said: “We’ve scaled rapidly in recent years, investing across geography, supply chain, technology, and talent. Financial discipline and patient retention are underpinning our growth, allowing us to invest in new markets and our digital platform, creating an improved patient experience, differentiation, and operational efficiencies.”
Addy Mohammed co-founded Simple Online Healthcare alongside university friend Karim Nassar, who is Simple Online's Chief Growth Officer, in 2015, building on their experience of owning and operating community pharmacies across Scotland to offer consumers a convenient patient-first pharmacy service with medications delivered direct to their door. The company has a headcount of 130, and plans to make additional hires this year.
Simple Online was one of the first providers of weight loss medications in the UK. The business has invested significantly in its weight management programme and is one of the leading providers of GLP-1 medications Wegovy and Mounjaro, which are prescribed alongside comprehensive holistic weight management support.
“We know global healthcare systems are struggling,” says Mohammed, “with the top issues being long waiting times, insufficient staff, and cost of treatments. We are using technology to give patients quick and discrete access to the care they need, at a much lower cost than traditional healthcare models. Combining technology with a multi-disciplinary team of health professionals, we can provide the personalised level of care you’d receive in a community pharmacy.”
Simple Online has invested over £2 million into technology and systems during 2025, with Mohammed commenting: “Digital healthcare is evolving rapidly, and we’re continuing to invest in technology to enhance the patient journey and deliver best-in-class care.”
“Our vision is to make healthcare affordable and accessible,” says Mohammed. “We support our patients with the personalised tools and knowledge to make long-term lifestyle changes.”
The global online pharmacy market is valued at almost £100 billion in 2025, and is forecast to grow to around £400 billion by 2033.
Simple Online’s board includes former Skyscanner CFO Shane Corstorphine, and the company is set to further strengthen its executive leadership team this year.
For more information: https://www.simpleonlinehealthcare.com/
Left to right are Michael Hope (CFO) and Addy Mohammed (Co-founder and CEO) of Simple Online Healthcare (by Stewart Attwood)
RHO, Italy (AP) — No ice is colder and harder than speedskating ice. The precision it takes has meant that Olympic speedskaters have never competed for gold on a temporary indoor rink – until the 2026 Milan Cortina Winter Games.
In the pursuit of maximum glide and minimum friction, Olympic officials brought on ice master Mark Messer, a veteran of six previous Olympic speedskating tracks and the ice technician in charge of the Olympic Oval in Calgary, Canada — one of the fastest tracks in the world with over 300 records.
Messer has been putting that experience to work one thin layer of ice at a time since the end of October at the new Speed Skating Stadium, built inside adjacent trade fair halls in the city of Rho just north of Milan.
“It’s one of the biggest challenges I’ve had in icemaking,’’ Messer said during an interview less than two weeks into the process.
If Goldilocks were a speedskater, hockey ice would be medium hard, for fast puck movement and sharp turns. Figure skating ice would be softer, allowing push off for jumps and so the ice doesn’t shatter on landing. Curling ice is the softest and warmest of all, for controlled sliding.
For speedskating ice to be just right, it must be hard, cold and clean. And very, very smooth.
“The blades are so sharp, that if there is some dirt, the blade will lose the edge,’’ Messer said, and the skater will lose speed.
Speedskater Enrico Fabris, who won two Olympic golds in Turin in 2006, has traded in his skates to be deputy sports manager at the speedskating venue in Rho. For him, perfect ice means the conditions are the same for all skaters — and then if it's fast ice, so much the better.
"It's more of a pleasure to skate on this ice,'' he said.
Messer’s first Olympics were in Calgary in 1988 — the first time speedskating was held indoors. “That gave us some advantages because we didn’t have to worry about the weather, wind blowing or rain,’’ he said. Now he is upping the challenge by becoming the first ice master to build a temporary rink for the Olympics.
Before Messer arrived in Italy, workers spent weeks setting up insulation to level the floor and then a network of pipes and rubber tubes that carry glycol — an antifreeze — that is brought down to minus 7 or minus 8 degrees Celsius (17.6 to 19.4 degrees Fahrenheit) to make the ice.
Water is run through a purification system — but it can’t be too pure, or the ice that forms will be too brittle. Just the right amount of impurities “holds the ice together,’’ Messer said.
The first layers of water are applied slowly, with a spray nozzle; after the ice reaches a few centimeters it is painted white — a full day’s work — and the stripes are added to make lanes.
“The first one takes about 45 minutes. And then as soon as it freezes, we go back and do it again, and again and again. So we do it hundreds of times,’’ Messer said.
As the ice gets thicker, and is more stable, workers apply subsequent layers of water with hoses. Messer attaches his hose to hockey sticks for easier spreading.
What must absolutely be avoided is dirt, dust or frost — all of which can cause friction for the skaters, slowing them down. The goal is that when the skaters push “they can go as far as possible with the least amount of effort,’’ Messer said.
The Zamboni ice resurfacing machine plays a key role in keeping the track clean, cutting off a layer and spraying water to make a new surface.
One challenge is gauging how quickly the water from the resurfacing machine freezes in the temporary rink.
Another is getting the ice to the right thickness so that the Zamboni, weighing in at six tons, doesn’t shift the insulation, rubber tubing or ice itself.
“When you drive that out, if there’s anything moving it will move. We don’t want that,’’ Messer said.
The rink got its first big test on Nov. 29-30 during a Junior World Cup event. In a permanent rink, test events are usually held a year before the Olympics, leaving more time for adjustments. “We have a very small window to learn,’’ Messer acknowledged.
Dutch speedskater Kayo Vos, who won the men’s neo-senior 1,000 meters, said the ice was a little soft — but Messer didn’t seem too concerned.
“We went very modest to start, now we can start to change the temperatures and try to make it faster and still maintain it as a safe ice,’’ he said.
Fine-tuning the air temperature and humidity and ice temperature must be done methodically — taking into account that there will be 6,000 spectators in the venue for each event. The next real test will be on Jan. 31, when the Olympians take to the ice for their first training session.
“Eighty percent of the work is done but the hardest part is the last 20 percent, where we have to try to find the values and the way of running the equipment so all the skaters get the same conditions and all the skaters get the best conditions,’’ Messer said.
AP Winter Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics
Serpentines are set on the ice of the stadium where speed skating discipline of the Milan Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics will take place, in Rho, outskirt of Milan, Tuesday, Nov. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)
Ice Master Mark Messer poses in the stadium where speed skating discipline of the Milan Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics will take place, in Rho, outskirt of Milan, Tuesday, Nov. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)
Workers clean the ice surface during a peed skating Junior World Cup and Olympic test event, in Rho, near Milan, Italy, Saturday, Nov. 29, 2025. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)
Ice Master Mark Messer poses in the stadium where speed skating discipline of the Milan Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics will take place, in Rho, outskirt of Milan, Tuesday, Nov. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)
Ice Master Mark Messer poses in the stadium where speed skating discipline of the Milan Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics will take place, in Rho, outskirt of Milan, Tuesday, Nov. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)
