Qliance Medical Management raises $6 million

A couple of billionaire techies are putting money into Seattle's Qliance Medical Management, a company experimenting with direct-pay medical clinics that operate outside the usual medical-insurance system.

The company is announcing that it raised $6 million from Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos, computer baron Michael Dell and Drew Carey, the comedian, actor and co-owner of the Seattle Sounders.

Also pitching in are Second Avenue Partners, New Atlantic Ventures and Clear Fir Partners. The firms invested earlier in the 4-year-old company, which has now received $13.5 million and runs three clinics in the Seattle area.

Instead of accepting health-insurance payments, Qliance charges patients monthly membership fees ranging from $44 to $84 to cover primary and preventive care such as checkups, vaccinations and minor fractures.

Chief Executive Norm Wu said the company wasn't looking for backers that are household names. It's in the process of raising a much larger amount to fund a national expansion, but Bezos, Dell and Carey heard about the company and wanted to get involved.

Wu said he worked as a consultant for Dell in the late 1980s, and Bezos and Carey heard from other Qliance investors.

"This is a steppingstone," he said. "What we're particularly happy about is we've got people who've been very successful developing transformative business models who can immediately relate to what we're doing."

Qliance plans to use the money to keep growing in Washington state, where Wu expects to double employment from its current 60 people over the next year, and to develop the company's technology platform. It operates clinics in Kent, Mercer Island and downtown Seattle and is considering new locations on the Eastside, in North Seattle and in Eastern Washington.

The national expansion should begin with a clinic in California next year. Wu said Qliance has been especially encouraged to expand by unions that are large purchasers of health care for their members.

Brier Dudley: 206-515-5687 or bdudley@seattletimes.com