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M3 Healthcare Research

M3 is a healthcare market research company, headquartered in Tokyo and publicly traded on the Tokyo Stock exchange. The firm has offices in several countries, including the US, UK, France, Germany, China, India and Korea.

M3 claims to have the world’s largest proprietary panel of verified healthcare professionals: 6.2 million across 70 markets, with members verified using photo ID. In 2021, M3 delivered more than 651,000 completed surveys across this panel, meaning ~10% of the members took a survey.

M3 offers a range of market research services:

  • Full-service quantitative research: from programming to fielding, to data processing. See our explainer on how the survey industry works here.

  • Qualitative research (including 1-on-1 interviews, focus groups, and online communities). See our explainer on how expert networks work here.

M3 was founded in 2000 by Itaru Tanimura, a McKinsey consultant. Initially, M3 was an online medical community for Japanese physicians, with an early investment from Sony Corporation. The company has spent two decades growing and acquiring healthcare panels and communities worldwide. Major milestones include:

  • 2002 - Acquiring WebMD in Japan

  • 2003 - Acquired MediPro from Sony

  • 2004 - Listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange

  • 2006 - Acquired MDLinx.com (USA) and Medigate.net (Korea)

  • 2008 - Acquired iTicket Corporation (Japan)

  • 2009 - Acquired Mebix (Japan), a clinical research firm.

  • 2010 - Acquired EMS Research (UK), and renamed the entire business M3 Inc. and international operations M3 Global Research.

  • 2011 - Acquired Doctors.net.uk (UK)

  • 2012 - Acquired MIC Medical and CMS (both in Japan)

  • 2013 - Acquired MedLive (China)

  • 2014 - Acuired Mediscience Planning (Japan)

  • 2017 - Acquired QQFS (Sweden) and Vidal Group (France)

  • 2018 - Acquired Wake Research (US)

  • 2020 - Acquired NAS Recruitment (US) and Manthan's healthcare MR division (India), later renamed to m360 Research

  • 2021 - Acquired Ekas (Australia) and One Health Communications (UK)

  • 2022 - Acquired Pharma-insight (Germany) and 3H Holdings (Japan)

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