Hi again,

This newsletter was a tough one to get out. Not because of COVID-19, which it finally seems the U.S. is getting under control, but because there were an all-time high of 47 deals this quarter. As you can see below, deal volume has been increasing rapidly over the past year with a growth rate of over 160% year-over-year.

Read on to dive into the exciting deals we saw this quarter, and if you were forwarded this newsletter from an obviously incredibly intelligent friend, make sure to…

Highlights

We’re doing something different for this edition’s highlights section. I was asked to summarize this quarter’s Agetech deals for the Longevity, Health & Innovation conference, so we’re going video! Check out the recording below:

Unfortunately we had to record at the beginning of March so while it highlights most of the major trends it misses out on some big deals that came after. Don’t fret though, all 47 deals this quarter are chronicled below. Read on…

In other news…

🎉 Medical home-visit startup Ambulnz went public via $1.1bn SPAC (link)

Instead of going getting SPAC’d like its competitor HIMS, Ro raised a $500m series D (link)

Fraction Technologies, creator of a new financial product which gives homeowners partial access to their home’s equity, raised C$289m in a combination of equity & debt to launch in Canada and start preparing for the US (link)

DispatchHealth, another medical home-visit provider, raised a $200m series D less than a year after its $135.8m series C to continue its rapid expansion into 100 markets (link)

Cityblock Health, a platform which helps payers surface medical and social care issues before they spiral out of control, raised a $192m series C extension to expand into North Carolina and Ohio (link)

Unite Us, which similarly to Cityblock links medical care with social services to provide holistic healthcare, became a unicorn after raising a $150m series C (link)

🎉 Telehealth provider Doctor On Demand merged with employer health plan navigator Grand Rounds merged to form a multibillion-dollar company that can tackle the issue of uncoordinated care from all angles (link)

Innovaccer, which collects disparate patient data into a unified patient record, raised a $70m series C to continue working towards its goal of creating 100 million records in the next fe years (link)

Health Recovery Solutions, a post-discharge remote patient monitoring solution, raised a $70m series C to achieve its goal of $52m in revenue by the end of this year (link)

Circulo raised a $50m series A out of the gate to use Olive.AI’s RPA system to build the Medicaid insurance company of the future (link)

🎉 Care-coordination service PatientPing was acquired by rival Appriss Health for an undisclosed amount (link)

Tyto Care, the telemedicine-powered home diagnostic device, raised a $50m series D to both build and buy new tools that expand its offerings (link)

MedMinder Systems, an online pharmacy and connected medication adherence device, raised a $40M series B to open additional automated pharmacy locations across the country (link)

Medisafe, the medication management app, raised a $30m series C to double the company's workforce and continue expanding into pharma (link)

100plus, a RPM solution started by ex-Practice Fusion execs, which is marred by scandal due to its involvement in the opioid epidemic , raised a $25m seed round (link)

🎉 Insurance giant Anthem has agreed to acquire myNEXUS, a platform which helps payers ensure that members’ home care is efficient and effective, for an undisclosed amount (link)

SteadyMD, a fully managed telehealth and pharmacy platform for individuals, employers, and healthcare systems looking to get into telehealth, raised a $25m series B (link)

Foodsmart, a food-as-medicine platform for payers which addresses food insecurity, inequity, and specialized diets, raised a $25m series C to build upon its already impressive 1.25m members (link)

Conversa, an automated virtual care platform, raised a $20m series B to support and build on the sixfold growth it experienced last year (link)

Apricus Health, which helps physicians extend their treatment of medicare patients beyond their walls, raised $20m to meet demand following its CMS approval as a direct contracting entity (link)

Health Gorilla, the API developer that makes it easy for products to integrate clinical data, raised a $15m series B to add new endpoints for consumers, payers, and data quality assessments (link)

Casana, formerly Heart Health Intelligence, raised a $14m series A to continue working on FDA clearance for its heart monitoring smart toilet seat (link)

🎉 GPM, maker of senior facility SaaS products GEHRIMED and CareTeam, was acquired by Netsmart for an undisclosed amount (link)

Insightin Health, which uses AI to help insurers engage with and retain their members, raised a $12m series A to try to maintain its 170% year-over-year growth (link)

Cohort, another virtual care management service, raised a $11m series B to grow its team and expand the capabilities of its clinical AI/NLP platform (link)

Harmonize, a remote patient monitoring service specialized for hypertension and other specific conditions, raised a $10m series A to capitalize on recent studies linking its use to a 30% decrease in ER visits (link)

Apploi, a platform for care providers which simplifies the process of recruiting, credentialing, and onboarding employees, raised a $8m series A to shift into sales & marketing mode (link)

Bold, an online workout video program designed for older adults, raised a $7m seed from Andreessen Horowitz to start scaling its platform (link)

Dina Care, which helps healthcare providers identify which organization a patient should be discharged to, raised a $7m series A to expand on its product (link)

MemoryWell, the journalist powered life story writing service that improves caregiving, raised a $2.5m seed round to expand into new products (link)

Project Well, which partners with health plans to provide food-as-medicine, raised a $2m seed round to convince more Medicare Advantage plans to come on board (link)

Socially Determined, a data analytics platform which helps organizations measure social determinants of health (SDoH) risks, quietly raised a $3.15m bridge (link)

NextStep, which offers an online training program for Certified Nursing Assistants, extended its initial fundraise of $2.5m to a total of $6.75m to accelerate beyond Colorado (link)

CircleLink Health, which performs chronic care and behavioral health management for physicians, quietly raised a $2.35m bridge (link)

Kevala, a staffing coordination and compliance platform for senior living facilities, raised $4m to grow the team and expand into more states (link)

Matchwell, an on-demand nurse staffing marketplace, quietly raised $4.1m (link)

eCare21, a combination telehealth / remote patient monitoring / chronic care management platform, raised a $2.7m seed round to fund its “ambitious expansion” into senior care, hospitals, and cardiologists (link)

Better Health Supplies, an online platform which helps individuals navigate their insurance and obtain needed medical supplies, has officially launched following the closing of a $3.5m seed round (link)

Around the world…

Pocketpills, self reportedly the “largest and fastest-growing Canadian online pharmacy”, raised a $30m series B to sustain its 5x growth last year (link)

Manual, a UK-based copycat of HIMS / Ro, raised a $30m series A to further its expansion throughout Europe and Latin America (link)

Glooko, a half-American / half-Swedish remote patient monitoring provider, raised a $30m series D to add new therapy areas and expand beyond the 7,500 clinics it already serves (link)

Oxehealth, a UK-based creator of vision-based patient monitoring, raised £10m to expand into the rest of Europe and beyond (link)

Sensi.ai, an Israeli AI-powered remote care quality assurance product co-founded by industry thought leader Keren the Gerontechnologist, raised $3.5m to expand into more US homecare agencies (link)

Lilli, a UK-based remote monitoring solution for home care, raised a £4.5M seed round to continue its pivot from hardware to software (link)

Kranus Health, a German men’s digital therapeutics developer, raised $1.2m to start scaling its ED therapy product (link)

Kenbi, a German startup that’s pioneering a new technology-based home care model, raised €7M (link)

That’s all for this newsletter. We’ll be back in a few months with more exciting Agetech News.

Help get more innovators, investors, and stakeholders involved in Agetech. Share Agetech News and show them the excitement and opportunity in the Longevity Economy

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Hey there,

With the COVID-19 death toll rapidly approaching 500,000 and an election that’s somehow not over, there more darkness than anyone anticipated as we roll into 2021. Fortunately, however, the SPAC-tacular Agetech activity has been overpowering my sadness and getting me excited to see what the next day brings. Read on to find out more, and as always if you have feedback or a funding update please reach out or leave a comment.

Highlights

🎉 The exits keep on coming: PointClickCare acquired Collective Medical for $650m

Yep, that’s right, a $650m Agetech exit; and since Collective Medical was last valued at $170m it represents an exciting exit for the company, the industry, and its investors. Even more exciting is the acquisition spree that PointClickCare has been on over the past two years. In May the company acquired Co-Pilot, an analytics solution developed by Consonus Healthcare, and in March of last year they acquired QuickMAR, a medical management tool for long-term and post-acute care. The lack of large acquisitions in the Agetech market has been one of the things holding back more investment, so it’s exciting to see those flood gates opening.

It also signifies that the shift to value-based care has fully arrived. The value-proposition of the acquisition is that the product combination will prevent individuals from slipping through the cracks. Now that health systems are penalized when patients are readmitted to the hospital after discharge, those crack slipping patients are costly. "[Together] we can stitch all those care settings together, much more seamlessly" - Chris Klomp, CEO Collective Medical.

If you want to know more about stitching care settings together, click here.

🎉 In the fight for prescriptions, UnitedHealth acquired Pillpack competitor DivvyDose for $300m

It seems like everyone’s trying to get into the pharmacy game these days. It started back in 2018 when Amazon surprised many by outbidding Walmart to acquire Pillpack for a whopping $1b, sending a strong signal that they’re coming to disrupt healthcare. Aetna quickly jumped into gear and combined with CVS to the tune of a $70b merger; and not wanting to be left out Walmart scooped up CareZone just a few months ago. Now we have another major insurer, UnitedHealth, picking up an online pharmacy of their own.

A big reason behind the acquisitions is to obtain the loyal base of customers that use these services, but it’s not the only one. For retailers like Amazon and Walmart, it’s a faster way to enter $300 billion pharmacy market than attempting to build and acquire regulatory approval from scratch. For UnitedHealth and the other smart incumbents, it’s a way to fight back. By being able to offer the same services as the retailers they’re able to keep their customers entirely within their own ecosystem, removing reasons for them to look elsewhere.

One of the most interesting aspects of this deal is that DivvyDose hadn’t raised a dime from venture capital or private equity funds. This used to be the norm for Agetech companies as few if any funds were willing to bet on the field, but is fortunately becoming increasingly rare.

For more on the acquisition, click here.

Agetech is SPAC-tacular

Everyone from Shaquille O'Neal to Playboy seems to be creating SPACs these days. Given how COVID-19 has highlighted so many needs and opportunities in helping older adults, it’s no wonder that Agetech is seeing so much SPAC-tivity:

• Immediately after announcing the $18.5b acquisition by Teladoc, Livongo execs decided to create a $500m SPAC (link)

• Clover Health, the Medicare Advantage provider founded in 2014, got SPAC’d in a deal worth $3.7b (link)

• Hims & Hers, which got its start by helping men with erectile dysfunction and hair loss, merged with a SPAC that now values the company at $1.6b (link)

• Not to be outdone, competitor Ro is reportedly attempting to do the same (link)

• UpHealth and Cloudbreak got SPAC-kled together to create a $1.35b company that claims to be one of the only "profitable, publicly-traded, comprehensive global digital healthcare companies." Right… (link)

• Robert Burke, the founder of UnitedHealth, is creating the Senior Connect Acquisition Corp - a $300m SPAC to acquire businesses serving seniors (link)

In other news…

🎉 Eargo soared 87% in it’s first trading day (link)

Honor raised a $140m series C (link)

Primetime Partners, the new VC firm led by Thrive Global’s Abby Levy and Greycroft’s Alan Patricof, raised $32m to invest in Agetech opportunities (link)

Pillar Life, initially focused on free student loan debt relief, raised a $1.5m seed extension from Kleiner Perkins to pivot into a caregiver support platform that stores loved ones’ important documents (link)

GetSetUp, a peer-to-peer online learning platform for older adults, raised $10m to accelerate growth and development (link)

Siren, maker of smart socks to detect and prevent ulcers, added $9m to its series B to grow its team and develop a new product that doesn’t require wifi or a smartphone (link)

Commure, which is developing an “app-store like” mechanism for building, distributing and deploying software for the health care community, raised $3.29m (link)

Lark Health, the digital chronic care management tool, scooped up $55 million in its series C round to expand beyond it’s partnership with Anthem into other insurance and telehealth providers (link)

Cerebral, a membership-based virtual mental health service, raised a $35m series A to expand into all 50 states (link)

Whisper, a subscription-based hearing aid maker, emerged from stealth and raised a $35m series B (link)

eVisit, a telehealth SaaS provider for medical practices, raised a $14m series A to expand beyond its 100 current clients (link)

Nice Healthcare, a primary care telehealth service for SMBs, raised a $5 million seed round to expand from five states into a total of 20 (link)

SnapNurse, the on-demand healthcare staffing platform, raised $15m to continue to build on its explosive growth in 2020 which saw revenue jump from $2m to $200m (link)

Lantern, a platform for end-of-life planning, raised a $1.4m seed round (link)

MedArrive, another medical home-visit startup led by ex-head of Uber Health Dan Trigub, raised $4.5m to begin operations in Florida (link)

Virta, a type-II diabetes management platform, raised a $65m series D at a valuation of over $1.1b to continue its expansion and accelerate R&D of evidence-based, non-pharmaceutical therapies for other costly metabolic conditions (link)

Verifiable, a company which automates healthcare credential verification, raised a $3m seed round (link)

Sidekick Health, makers of a gamified digital therapeutics platform for chronic disease management, raised a $20m series A to enter the US market (link)

Homethrive, the family caregiver help and support platform, announced an $18m series A to continue expanding into new health plans and self-insured employers (link)

Curve Health, a platform that helps SNFs and health systems provide better care and reduce readmissions, raised a $6m seed round to hire a new CEO and accelerate its sales (link)

CoreCare, an AI product that improves revenue by reducing medical billing errors, raised a $3m seed round to continue its rapid expansion (link)

Troy Medicare, a technology-enabled Medicare Advantage plan designed to empower independent pharmacies, raised a $10m series B from AXA to expand beyond North Carolina (link)

Nymbl Science, makers of a fall prevention digital therapeutic, raised a $4m series A to continue scaling internationally (link)

OutSense, creators of a clip-on toilet bowl sensor to detect life-threatening diseases, raised a $2.2m series A to commercialize the device and obtain FDA clearance (link)

K Health, the AI-powered flat-fee telemedicine service, raised $42m series D to keep up with its explosive, 10,000+ new users per day, growth (link)

ClosedLoop.ai, the company working to identify the 5% of individuals that account for over 50% of healthcare spending before they even walk into the doctor’s office, raised an $11m series A to continue improving its technology (link)

Coviu, an Australia-based telehealth startup, raised A$6m to fuel its explosive growth (link)

AceAge, maker of a smart pill dispenser, raised a CAD$5m series A from strategic partner CareRx (link)

Neuroglee, a Singapore-based startup developing a digital therapeutic for early-stage dementia, raised a $2.3m seed round to begin clinical trials (link)

Olive, the developer of an artificial intelligence workforce for the health care industry, raised $225.5m to develop a new AI co-worker and product to help hospitals get paid faster from insurance claims (link)

Socially Determined, which helps health care organizations assess and act on SDoH health, raised an additional $3.15 million in debt (link)

NextStep, an online CNA training and placement program that guarantees employment, raised a $3m bridge (link)

CircleLink Health, a product for physicians to outsource chronic care management, raised $2.2m (link)

Kraydel, an Irish startup which connects seniors with their network via their TV, is close to its £1.35m crowdfunding goal (link)

That’s all for this newsletter. We’ll be back in a few months with more exciting Agetech news. In the meantime, feel free to reach out or leave a comment.

Help get more innovators, investors, and stakeholders interested in Agetech. Share Agetech News and show them how much excitement and opportunity there is in the Longevity Economy

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Hi again,

With COVID-19 numbers continuing to rise, businesses closed, and no end in sight, it can be hard to find any source of optimism. The place I’ve been able to find it is Agetech. From seed financings to multi-billion dollar mergers, there’s more happening in Agetech than ever before. Read on to find out, and as always if you have feedback or a funding update please reach out or leave it in the comments below.

Highlights

Say what!? “Invisible” hearing aid manufacturer Eargo raised $71m and just weeks later filed for an IPO

For those of you who’ve been reading this newsletter for a while, hearing (pun intended) that an innovative hearing aid manufacturer raised millions comes as no surprise. Barriers to entry have been knocked down, and there’s been a marked increase in funding for innovations that promote accessibility. Big tech has also been investing heavily in making their products more usable for everyone — last year Google launched Live Transcribe and Sound Amplifier apps to help hearing-impaired users communicate, while Microsoft is using various AI and machine learning technologies to improve accessibility.

What is surprising is how quickly the company is preparing to IPO, something that has been incredibly rare in this Agetech space, as well as the broader startup ecosystem. In the 2010’s we saw only a few tech companies go public, with the results being very hit-or-miss: Tesla surged while Facebook, Groupon, and Snap all fell, with only one of them recovering. This led to the rise of mega-funds like Softbank’s Vision Fund, which enabled companies to stay private longer. However, somehow in the midst of the biggest worldwide crisis in a generation, this decade-plus long tide has changed. Big names like One Medical, Amwell, Palantir, Asana, and Unity have already gone public this year, with Doordash, Wish, Airbnb, and now Eargo preparing to do the same.

It’s not entirely clear why this wind change is happening now, with the global economy in turmoil and the future so uncertain. It could be the recent high-profile falters of vision fund companies, the changing consumer demands due to the pandemic, or something else, but whatever the reason it’s bringing back an exciting exit pathway that this space has been sorely missing. Stay tuned for more exciting Agetech IPOs coming this year and likely into 2021 as well.

“The window is open, everyone has figured out that a virtual IPO is possible. There’s an appetite for companies to go public.” - Previn Waas, IPO specialist at Deloitte

Here’re links to more info on the fundraise and IPO if you’re interested.

🎉 In the third-largest deal this year, Teladoc acquired Livongo for $18.5b

Some people are calling it an acquisition, others a merger, but whatever it is it’s a big deal to the tune of a joint enterprise value of about $37b. It’s the epitome of what we’ve been seeing throughout this pandemic, the explosive growth of both telehealth and remote care / digital therapeutics as individuals requiring treatment attempt to obtain care while remaining home. As of the date of the announcement Teladoc had already tripled in value this year and Livongo was up almost six-fold.

The two businesses complement each other nicely to create what executives are calling “whole person care”. Teladoc allows patients to see doctors and specialists when needed, while Livongo keeps patients engaged and following treatment plans in-between telehealth visits. They also have little overlap between their current customers - only 25% - which no doubt helped the deal wrap up so quickly, in under 3 months. With the financial tailwinds of the telehealth boom and investor interest in digital health spurred by the COVID-19 pandemic, make sure to watch this space, I expect we’ll be seeing more activity very soon.

“Stock prices have gotten so high with these tech companies and COVID-19 plays that they’re going to use their stock as currency to make acquisitions like this.”

For more about this historic merger, click here.

Medical home-visit startups are red hot: Heal raised $100m & Ready raised $54m

Fresh off the heels (another pun!) of DispatchHealth’s $135.8m fundraise which we chronicled in the last newsletter, Heal and Ready have both armed their war chests in response:

1. Heal raised $100m to expand beyond the 8 states it operates in and start providing both physical therapy and dermatology (link)

2. Ready, which does home-visits as well as telemedicine, raised a $54m series C to expand its services to mental health, point-of-care testing, and vaccinations (link)

It’s not surprising how well this category is doing, particularly given how it compliments telehealth, which is booming. No matter how good the medical provider is on the other side of the screen, there are limits to what telehealth can provide. When they need to draw blood or perform a physical, telehealth physicians can now call on these new home-visit companies and rely on them to perform in-person all that they cannot do virtually.

In other news…

Doctor on Demand, the on-demand telehealth startup, raised a $75m series D to keep up with COVID-19 based demand and expand its mental health services (link)

Oak Street Health, which operates primary care centers for Medicare patients, raised $328m in its IPO, valuing the company at $8.8b (link)

PayActiv, the fintech product helping care providers retain employees, raised a $100m series C to rapidly expand its customer base (link)

The Helper Bees, home care meets insuretech startup, raised a $6m series A to expand into worker’s comp and disability insurance (link)

Uniper Care, the TV-based at-home engagement platform, raised a $4m series A extension to keep up with demand and accelerate product development (link)

Roundtrip, the non-emergency medical transportation provider, also raised a $4m series A extension to expand into new markets (link)

Trusty.care, the AI-based optimal medicare plan chooser, raised a $1.5m seed extension to fuel its pivot to a SaaS product for brokers (link)

True Link, the fintech for family caregivers platform, raised a $35m series B to add life insurance and more credit-based services into its lineup (link)

Patient Ping, the medical care-coordination notification service, raised a $60m series C to expand into new US markets (link)

K4Connect, the company that’s digitizing senior care facilities, raised a $7.7m series B extension to attempt to penetrate the aging-in-place market (link)

Evidation, the virtual clinical trial data collection platform, raised a $45m series D to extend into virtual treatment (link)

🎉 Carely, the family caregiver support and engagement app, went on an acquisition spree acquiring both Ro & Steve & Caregiving.com for undisclosed amounts

Orpyx, developer of smart insoles to prevent ulcers, raised a $7.6m series A to start commercializing its technology (link)

Mighty Health, the nutrition and fitness wellness app for older adults, raised a $2.8m seed round to beef up the product team and start integrating with fitness trackers (link)

Withings, manufacturer of smart scales and other devices for remote monitoring, raised a $60m series B to scale its care provider-facing offerings and add 100 employees (link)

Bodyport, inventor of a smart scale that can detect signs of cardiovascular disease, raised a $11.2m series A to get FDA clearance and start commercializing its device (link)

Thirty Madison, provider of telemedicine for hair loss, migraines, and acid reflux, raised a $47m series B from Johnson & Johnson to expand into other chronic conditions and urgent care (link)

Podimetrics, creator of a smart mat for foot ulcer prevention, added $8m in a series B extension to accelerate its sales efforts within the VA and to other payers (link)

Carewell, an e-commerce site for family caregivers, raised a $5m seed to expand its product offerings and develop more educational resources (link)

Medigate, the cybersecurity startup which protects IoT and smart medical devices, raised a $30m series B to continue scaling and expand into clinical analytics (link)

Papa, provider of grandchildren-on-demand, raised a $18m series D to expand into an additional 4 states, bringing the total to 21 so far (link)

🎉 Sentrics, the all-in-one safety & engagement platform for senior living facilities, acquired Luna Lights for an undisclosed amount (link)

TCare, the platform that uses predictive analytics to prevent family caregiver burnout, raised a $3m series A to expand geographically (link)

Domalys, creator of a connected lamp that prevents falls, raised €4.5m to attempt to penetrate the US market (link)

That’s all for this newsletter. We’ll be back in a few months with more exciting Agetech news. In the meantime, feel free to reach out or leave a comment below.

Help get more innovators, investors, and stakeholders interested in Agetech. Share Agetech News and show them how much excitement and opportunity there is in the Longevity Economy

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Hi again,

COVID-19 has been taking its toll on all of us in one way or another, I hope you’re all staying healthy and safe. Unsurprisingly it’s having a particularly devastating effect on elder care, and providers are scrambling to figure out how to provide care while limiting the risk of exposure to both its clients and staff. The tiny silver lining to the pandemic is that these organizations, which have generally been hesitant to adopt new technology, are now welcoming any innovation that they think might help. In terms of technology adoption, 10 years of progress has been made in the last 3 months.

With so much happening we’ve had to change the format of this newsletter, there’s just too much news to fit! So while we’ll still provide brief analysis on the bigger news items, we’ll list the rest briefly and provide links if you want to dive deeper. We’ve also changed platforms to Substack, which is better for newsletters like this.

Read on to find out all that’s been happening in Agetech, and as always if you have feedback or a funding update please reach out or leave it in the comments below.

Highlights

🎊 Telehealth is booming - United Optum purchased AbleTo just months after scooping up Vivify Health and PatientsLikeMe

Telehealth is having its day in the sun. With the COVID-19 pandemic spreading and stay-at-home orders being issued throughout the country, providers and patients alike are being forced to quickly adopt virtual solutions, causing an explosion in Telehealth usage. Like other providers of remote health services, particularly in the area of mental health, AbleTo is seeing increased demand as people across the country deal with the medical and economic fallout of COVID-19. Ginger, a startup that provides on-demand mental care, has reported a 50% increase in utilization since the pandemic began.

This move makes a lot of sense for insurance giant UnitedHealth, which has come under fire for reportedly denying mental health treatment to its customers. Whether or not that’s true, by acquiring AbleTo it’ll be able to provide better mental health services to its members for a fraction of the cost.

Even before the pandemic, the remote mental healthcare space was heating up, with startups like Talkspace raising over $100m and larger players, like Teladoc and Amwell, increasingly investing in their offerings. There’s still a lot of room to grow, I expect we’ll be seeing a lot more activity in this space.

“Mismatch between supply and demand for mental health services is massive and growing, making virtual care models that scale a winning value proposition. Without the stigma associated with in-person visits, removing barriers to care-seeking may free up latent demand for service growth.”

Click here for more coverage of United's acquisitions.

It’s not only telehealth that’s thriving: on-demand doctor home visit service DispatchHealth raised $135.8m

If Telehealth is about providing care across distance, DispatchHealth is the opposite. Essentially an urgent care clinic on wheels, patients and providers can request care from the app and within two hours arrives a fully-equipped medical team ready to tackle just about anything.

Part of the larger hospital at home movement, DispatchHealth partners with insurers to reduce the enormous cost of facility-based care, currently around one-third of total healthcare spending here in the U.S. It estimates that in the 7 years and over 170,000 patient visits provided since founding, more than $200 million in medical expenses has been saved via avoiding hospital and skilled nursing facility admissions. It’s not alone in this space however, competitor Heal has raised over $71m and is nipping at its… heels. Sorry, I couldn’t resist.

“Home is increasingly the place where people prefer to receive their care. This is especially true for older adults with multiple chronic conditions.” Susan Diamond, Segment President, Humana.

For more on DispatchHealth, click here.

☠️ Once valued at $1.5b, ingestible medication adherence sensor startup Proteus Digital Health filed for Bankruptcy

Proteus just added itself to the list of over-hyped startup failures, next to the likes of Juicero and WeWork. Like those companies, Proteus championed an exciting product - a “smart pill” that can track medication adherence from inside the body - but despite raising more than $500m failed to create a viable business. We can learn some important lessons here:

1. Keep burn rate under control. At the end Proteus was burning too much cash, around $2 million a month, despite not having a clear path to profitability. Unsurprisingly, investors weren’t willing to throw more money into the fire.

2. Don’t put all your eggs in one partnership. The $88 million deal Proteus signed with Otsuka in 2018 was a big score, but when the pharma giant pulled out earlier this year they had nothing to fall back on. This shouldn’t have come as a surprise given the fickleness of big pharma, just last year Novartis' Sandoz dropped out of its deal with Pear Therapeutics and Sanofi pulled back from its three-year-old relationship with Verily.

3. Don’t assume people will use the product just because it’s “cool”. Proteus’ device doubled the monthly prescription cost. Even if hadn’t blundered by initially targeting a condition that causes paranoia and distrust of technology (schizophrenia), neither payers nor patients were willing to front the cost.

“I think the key issue here is ‘So what? So, you have a cool technology. A cool technology by itself does not make a successful business.'"

Click here to dive deeper into Proteus.

In other news…

Amwell, the telehealth platform, raised a $194m series C and only weeks later filed for an IPO (link)

Lifesprk, the innovative home care agency, raised a $16.1m series A to launch its Electronic “Life” Record (link)

Cariloop, the family caregiver support platform, raised a $6m series A to double its staff and quadruple the number of caregivers on its platform (link)

🎊 Omada Health, the chronic disease management digital therapeutic, raised $57m to acquire Physera (link)

Wellth, the behavioral economics based Medication adherence app, raised a $10m series A to expand into new use cases (link)

Heart Health Intelligence raised $2.2m to build a smart toilet seat (link)

MyndYou, the AI voice diagnostic platform, raised a $3m series A to extend care to isolated older adults (link)

Pager, the all-in-one care coordination app, raised $33m in equity & debt to expand into South America and beyond (link)

🎊 Supercarers, the platform to find home caregivers, was acquired by Home Instead UK for an undisclosed amount (link)

CareAcademy, the professional caregiver training platform, raised a $9.5m series A to help more care workers upskill (link)

Element5, the home care back-office automation company, raised a $2.5m seed to start selling into home care agencies (link)

Routinify, the remote home care platform, raised a $1.5m seed to begin sales to consumers and home care agencies (link)

Conversa, the chatbot-based remote patient monitoring solution, raised a $12m series B to become the “digital front door” to care providers (link)

🎊 CareZone, the medication management app, was acquired by Walmart for an undisclosed amount (link)

🎊 Unite Us acquired SDoH (social determinants of health) predictive analytics tool Staple Health for an undisclosed amount (link)

That’s all for this newsletter. We’ll be back in a few months with more exciting Agetech news. In the meantime, feel free to reach out or leave a comment below.

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Hi everyone,

The Agetech Newsletter is back and better than ever! I’m excited to announce that Allison Becker, who runs the Aging2.0 New York chapter with me, has joined to help compile the latest in Agetech news. Allison comes to us with a deep background in aging innovation, having worked with startups like Audicus, Pixie, and Silverbills addressing issues in the health, financial wellness, and lifestyle spaces. She also received a master’s in Journalism from Columbia, so expect some next-level output from us going forward.

With COVID-19 currently dominating the headlines we’d be remiss to not talk about it here. Unsurprisingly, the senior care industry is scrambling to figure out how to mitigate its effects since older adults are particularly susceptible. Many communities, like Aegis Living Marymoor in Redmond, WA, are instituting “community-wide isolation,” barring visitors, closing dining rooms and canceling group activities. While these measures protect residents from the virus, they have the potential to exacerbate existing issues - social isolation being chief among them - as well as restrict access to needed medical professionals.

Agetech companies can alleviate many of these problems: telemedicine can be used to access medical professionals even when quarantined; on-demand staffing companies can be used to replace caregivers that call out sick; simple video call technologies like Facetime and OneClick.chat can help families stay in contact with their loved ones without them having to resort to knocking on windows; and the list goes on. For any of these to provide widespread benefits, however, operators need to get on the bandwagon and start implementing these technologies quickly, something that they’ve traditionally been terrible at in even the best of times.

Hope this newsletter provides a brief distraction. Enjoy!

On-demand staffing is having its day in the sun

Ask any senior living, home care, or medical provider what their number one issue is and they’ll all give you the same answer: staffing. Providers do not have nearly enough caregivers to support their operations, forcing them to pay large amounts of overtime and even turn away potential new clients. Many startups are being founded to combat these staffing shortages, and one sub-sector that is seeing explosive growth is “on-demand staffing”. While more of a bandaid than solution, these companies are providing tremendous value by helping providers solve their short-term staffing challenges.

Intelycare raised a $45mm Series B round for its AI platform that matches nurses and CNAs with shift work. Medtech PE firm Endeavour Vision led the round, which also included Kaiser Permanente and Generator Ventures. Now that the company employs more than 11,000 nurses, it plans to invest much of the new funding on advancing its data science to reduce nurse burnout and turnover. As one of the leaders in this burgeoning industry, and with a ton of cash at play, it’ll be exciting to see what they can accomplish.

Gento raised $5mm for its on-demand clinician marketplace. The Series A round, led by Palisades Growth Capital, will help Gento expand to Florida and New York, and improve its tech offerings. Five thousand clinicians are already on the app, which is available in cities including Las Vegas, Chicago, and Houston, and in the states of New Jersey and California.

NurseDash, one of the first movers in the on-demand staffing space, is expanding beyond hospitals and into senior living. The company unlocks extra capacity in overstretched markets by allowing caregivers to easily pick up unfilled shifts in nearby facilities. This is a win for everyone as caregivers are able to supplement their income, while facilities are able to staff up and reduce overtime costs. Additionally, NurseDash is expanding its offerings to other roles facing shortages including specialty nursing and technicians.

AlayaCare fast-tracks US expansion by acquiring Arrow Solutions

Canada-based AlayaCare, which develops software solutions for home care providers, has acquired New York-based Arrow Solutions. Frustrated by bloated and expensive offerings, industry veterans Michael Appel & Oren Waldman founded Arrow to help agencies simplify their day-to-day operational complexities. “The acquisition of Arrow Solutions is the cornerstone of our expansion into the U.S. Medicaid market and beyond,” said Adrian Schauer, AlayaCare founder & CEO.

While terms of the deal were not disclosed, this acquisition is likely the one the company hinted at in January when it closed a $47.9mm CAD extension of its Series C. AlayaCare has been on an acquisition streak as of late having just acquired Procura, one of its largest global competitors. Founded in 2014, the company has already raised over $115.8 million CAD and acquired 4 companies, and it’s showing no signs of stopping.

Intuition Robotics raises $36mm but you still can’t get Elli-Q

Intuition Robotics, creator of the highly publicized Elli-Q robot, has raised $36mm in its Series B round led by SPARX Group and OurCrowd, a crowd-funding platform. The company has been an exceptional fundraiser, having obtained a total of $58mm since its founding in 2015 from notable names like Bloomberg Beta, iRobot, and Toyota AI Ventures.

Interestingly, however, all that cash has yet to produce a commercial product. Elli-Q was available for pre-order throughout 2019 but now is only available for demonstration purposes. As we mentioned in our first newsletter, social robots have had a tough time finding success in this market, and it’s likely that the $1,500 price tag wasn’t helping either. With the company announcing the development of an assistant for Toyota vehicles, we won’t be surprised if they soon announce that they’re pivoting away from the older market altogether.

As more providers turn to telemedicine, startups benefit

Back in 2010, President Obama proposed ‘Connecting America: The National Broadband Plan’ in large part to facilitate the advancement of the burgeoning telemedicine industry. Almost a decade later we’re finally starting to see this growth with the launch and funding of companies like Third Eye Health, Tembo Health, and:

Wheel, a platform that helps telemedicine companies launch and expand their offerings, raised a $13.9 million Series A. Initially a marketplace connecting telehealth providers with licensed physicians, the company plans to use the funding to move into compliance, helping clients navigate the complex regulatory & legal requirements as they expand. Navigating these issues is often a major roadblock for companies, making Wheel an even more valuable partner for telehealth providers looking to scale.

Connecticut-based Tapestry, which bills itself as an entire medical center at the patients’ bedside, raised a Series A round led by Sopris Capital. While Tapestry originally focused on servicing rural SNFs, it plans to expand its services into urban areas and beyond. “We have a big plan to push into home care [...] where we can manage chronically ill populations the same way as we do when they live in the nursing home,” said Tapestry COO Mordy Eisenberg.

And this brings our newsletter to an end. We’re Max Zamkow & Allison Becker from Aging2.0 New York and Third Act Ventures, a venture firm that invests specifically in startups working to make life better for older adults and their caregivers. If you have any comments or questions, please email us at editors@agetech.news.

Thanks for reading!