News and deals roundup: CoverMyMeds ‘big bang’, Noom’s $540M Series F, insurtech Bright Health’s IPO, Grand Rounds-Included Health, GoodRx, Cedar-OODA, Huma, Bluestream Health’s outreach

McKesson shmushes four units into CoverMyMeds. McKesson’s Big Bang combines four McKesson business units–RelayHealth (pharmacy networking), McKesson Prescription Automation (software), CoverMyMeds (medication access for patients), and RxCrossroads by McKesson (therapeutic and drug commercialization). They are being reassembled into one massive unit under the CoverMyMeds name. The unit will have about 5,000 people and will be headed by Nathan Mott. More here in a blog post/announcement posting that’s short on information and long on cheerleading.

And the funding rounds keep marching down the alphabet. Noom, the weight loss app, gained a generous Series F of $540 million led by Silver Lake with participation from Oak HC/FT, Temasek (Singapore), Novo Holdings, Sequoia Capital, RRE and Samsung Ventures. Valuation is now at $4 billion. Adam Karol, a managing director at Silver Lake, and former TaskRabbit chief executive Stacy Brown-Philpot will join Noom’s board. The fresh funding will be used to expand into areas such as stress and anxiety, diabetes, hypertension, and sleep.

Noom had a banner year in 2020, with $400 million in revenues as people tried to shed Pandemic Pounds (aided by a near-ubiquitous ad push). The app has had 45 million downloads to date in 100 countries, largely in the US, UK, Canada, Australia, Ireland, and New Zealand. According to a (paywalled) Bloomberg News report, feelers are out for an IPO which may be valued at $10 billion. TechCrunch, Reuters, FierceHealthcare

Bright Health Group filed its S-1 registration statement with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Their rumored $1 billion IPO will be on the NYSE and trade under the symbol BHG. Timing, share value, and number of shares are to be determined. It’s speculated that the valuation at that point is expected to be between $10 and $20 billion. Bright Health is an insurtech operating exchange and Medicare Advantage (MA) health plans under Bright HealthCare  in 14 states and 50 markets, covering over 620,000 lives. They also have a separate care delivery channel called NeueHealth, 61 advanced risk-bearing primary care clinics delivering in-person and virtual care to 75,000 unique patients. Last month, they purchased Zipnosis, adding their white-labeled telemedicine for large health systems business. Bright Health Group release, Mobihealthnews

Short takes:

Doctor on Demand and Grand Rounds, which finalized their merger earlier this month, have agreed to acquire Included Health. Terms and timing were not disclosed. Included Health specializes in care concierge and healthcare navigation services for the LGBTQ+ community. FierceHealthcare, Release

GoodRx acquired rival RxSaver for $50 million in cash in late April to bulk up against Amazon. FierceHealthcare

Medical billing and pre-visit tech company Cedar is acquiring payer workflow tech company OODA Health for $425 million deal in a mix of cash and equity. It’s expected to close at end of May. OODA’s co-founder, chairman, and co-CEO is Giovanni Colella, MD, also co-founded Castlight Health and founded RelayHealth (see above), so another successful exit for him. FierceHealthcare, HISTalk

London-based Huma, raised $130 million in a Series C. Leaps by Bayer and Hitachi Ventures led the round. The former, mysterious Medopad now seems to have settled on a platform that supports ‘hospital at home’ plus pharma and research companies in large, decentralized clinical trials. There’s an add-on of $70 million to the Series C that can be exercised at a later date. Release, HISTalk

White-label telehealth provider Bluestream Health is partnering with The Azadi Project to provide virtual care services to refugee women and girls fleeing from countries like AfghanistanIranIraq, and Syria for safety in Greece. “Bluestream Health has teamed with The Azadi Project to provide a virtual care platform that stretches around the world. The women fleeing war-torn and conflict-affected countries have suffered unspeakable abuse, and while seeking safety in Greece, they are further exposed to terrible living conditions and hostility.”  said Matthew Davidge, co-founder and CEO of Bluestream Health.  Release

News roundup: First Stop, GlobalMed, American Well, Avizia, Medicity, Health Catalyst, Allscripts, Welbeing, BenevolentAI

[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Lasso.jpg” thumb_width=”125″ /]Announcements and acquisitions have been multiplying–here’s what’s most interesting.

In companies we’ve recently written about:

Our recent Contributor Bruce Judson, now with corporate telemedicine provider First Stop Health, wrote us enroute to the Government Finance Officials Association conference in St. Louis that FSH achieved triple-digit top-line revenue growth and also achieved an average utilization rate of 52 percent. The formal announcement was made earlier this week at the HLTH conference in Las Vegas (release), where another one of our Contributors, Sarianne Gruber, is attending for Answers Media Company.

GlobalMed, a prior contributor to Perspectives, is offering a lower cost telemedicine alternative to practices with a flat fee starting at $799 per month for three years. Startup costs remain at about $5,000. The starting kit includes a cart, a total exam camera, stethoscope and vitals linked to the organization’s network, and a nurse license. Additional compatible equipment is available at extra cost. We know that a number of comparable telemedicine cart-based kits run upwards of $8,000. It is one of the first public acknowledgments this Editor has seen (but has known for years) that high cost is a major impediment for implementing both telehealth and telemedicine in practices. Health Data Management.

In other news:

Telemedicine and telehealth consolidation continues with American Well’s acquisition of hospital-based telemed/workflow systems provider Avizia. Avizia has a product line of telemedicine carts and workflow software for 40 different specialties, including telestroke and telebehavioral health. The acquisition price was not disclosed. Prior investors in this 2013 Cisco spinoff include Northwell Health, NY-Presbyterian, HealthQuest, and other providers in seven rounds totaling over $23 million. Healthcare IT News

A further sign of consolidation, this time in the crowded health information business, is the Medicity acquisition by Health Catalyst. Health Catalyst is primarily a data analytics and warehousing company while Medicity focuses more on data interoperability and patient engagement for practices, health systems, and HIEs. Medicity was purchased by Aetna in 2011 with much fanfare for $500 million as one of its ‘Emerging Businesses’, rebranded as Healthagen in 2013 [TTA 28 Feb 14] which never quite took off. Out of that unit, what remains are Active Health Solutions and Aetna Accountable Care Solutions, a payer-driven value-based care management company. The amount of the sale was not disclosed but is expected to close in 90 days. Health Catalyst’s CEO Brent Dover served as president of Medicity up to 2013, and both companies are located in Salt Lake City. What is interesting about this sale is that CVS, which is buying Aetna, has no comparable in-house technology. It’s a probable shedding of peripheral or money-losing businesses prior to sale.  HISTalk, MedCityNews

Allscripts continues on its acquisition binge with patient communication and engagement platform HealthGrid. HealthGrid is a mobile app platform that delivers care and education materials traditionally distributed from practices to patients via paper. In January, Allscripts bought practice EHR Practice Fusion for $100 million (a loss to investors) and earlier McKesson’s HIT business for $185 million. It’s a noticeable shift to value-added care tools for this formerly EHR-centric company. Mobihealthnews. 

In UK news:

Welbeing has won Norwich City Council’s Norwich Community Alarm Service (NCAS). It provides a 24-hour, year-round monitoring and response service for over 6,500 adults who are vulnerable or at risk in this part of East Anglia. The press release is on UK Telehealthcare‘s news page. 

BenevolentAI, a UK company using artificial intelligence for drug development, raised $115 million in new funding, mostly from undisclosed investors in the United States, according to Mobihealthnews, for a total funding of over $200 million. The company uses AI to reduce drug discovery time and risk. It does not do its own drug discovery but sells the intellectual property discovered by their AI algorithms, claiming to cut drug development timelines by four years and improve efficiencies by 60 percent compared to pharma industry averages.

Updated–Rounding up this week’s news: VA budget, Shulkin’s troubles, ATA’s new CEO, Allscripts’ wheeling-dealing, Roche buys Flatiron, Nokia out of health?, NHS Carillioning?

[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Lasso.jpg” thumb_width=”100″ /]Here’s our roundup for the week of 12 February:

VA wins on the budget, but the Secretary’s in a spot of bother. Updated. Last week started off as a good week for Secretary Shulkin with a White House budget proposal that increased their $83.1 billion budget by 11.7 percent, including $1.2 billion for Year 1 of the Cerner EHR implementation in addition to the agency’s $4.2 billion IT budget which includes $204 million to modernize VistA and other VA legacy IT systems in the interim. While the Cerner contract went on hold in December while record-sharing is clarified, the freeze is expected to be lifted within a month. POLITICO  Where the trouble started for Dr. Shulkin was in the findings of a spending audit by the VA’s Inspector General’s Office of an official European trip to Copenhagen and London which included unreimbursed travel by Mrs. Shulkin and free tickets to Wimbledon, at least partly justified by a doctored email. This has led to the early retirement of the VA Chief of Staff Vivieca Wright Simpson and also an investigation of hacking into Wright Simpson’s email. It also appears that some political appointees in the VA are being investigated for misconduct. CNBC, FierceHealthcare.

Updated: POLITICO doesn’t feel the love for Dr. Shulkin in today’s Morning eHealth, linking to articles about the supposed ‘internal war’ at the VA, with veterans’ groups, with the Trump Administration, and within the VA. It’s the usual governmental infighting which within the 16 Feb article is being whipped by POLITICO and co-author ProPublica to a fevered pitch. Dr. Shulkin comes across as doctor/tech geek who underestimated the politicization of and challenges within an agency with the mission to care for our veterans. It’s also an agency having a hard time facing the current demands of a dispersed, younger and demanding veteran group plus aging, bureaucratic infrastructure. As usual the ‘privatization’ issue is being flogged as an either/or choice whereas a blend may serve veterans so much better.

Digital health entrepreneur named CEO of the American Telemedicine Association. A first for ATA is a chief from the health tech area who is also one of the all-too-rare executive women in the field. Ann Mond Johnson, who will be starting on 5 March, was previously head of Zest Health, board chair and advisor to Chicago start-up ConnectedHealth (now part of Connecture), and had sold her first start-up company Subimo to WebMD in 2006. She began her career in healthcare data and information with The Sachs Group (now part of Truven/IBM Watson). Ms. Johnson replaces founding CEO Jonathan Linkous, who remained for 24 years before resigning last August and is now a consultant. ATA release, mHealth Intelligence. ATA relocated in January from Washington DC to nearby Arlington Virginia. And a reminder that ATA2018 is 29 April – 1 May in Chicago and open for registration.

Allscripts’ ‘Such a Deal’! Following up on Allscripts’ acquisitions of Practice Fusion for $100 million (a loss to investors) and earlier McKesson’s HIT business for $185 million [TTA 9 Jan], it hasn’t quite paid for itself, but came very close with the sale of McKesson’s OneContent, a healthcare document-management system, for a tidy $260 million. Net price: $25 million. Their CEO is some horse trader! Some of the savings will undoubtedly go to remedying the cyberattack in January that affected two data centers in North Carolina, shutting down EHR and billing applications for approximately 1,500 physician practices, which have launched a class action lawsuit. FierceHealthcare 

Flatiron Health acquired by Roche. (more…)

EHR action: Allscripts acquires Practice Fusion, expands footprint in small/ambulatory practices

A significant EHR acquisition kicks off an action-packed week. Announced today by leading EHR Allscripts is their acquisition for $100 million of independent practice EHR Practice Fusion. Allscripts, which has been usually in the top five US EHRs (Kalorama April 2017 survey), vastly expanded its hospital market share with August’s acquisition of #2 McKesson‘s health IT business and with this would be ranked just behind EHR leader Cerner. In acute care settings, Epic and Cerner dominate with 25 percent of the market each with Allscripts/McKesson far behind #3 Meditech (KLAS April 2017). 

Practice Fusion, one of the pioneers in the small practice/ambulatory EHR starting with a basic free, ad-paid model in 2005, has 30,000 ambulatory sites serving about 5 million patients each month. In the Allscripts view, they will now be able to offer “last mile” reach to the under-served clinicians in small and individual practices” and close gaps in care. Allscripts President Rick Poulton noted in the statement that “We believe this transaction will directly benefit Practice Fusion clients, who will now have access to Allscripts solutions and services. We look forward to welcoming Practice Fusion team members to our family.” which leads one to believe that the Practice Fusion name will be sunsetted. Allscripts release and Healthcare IT News

From being the leader in small practice EHRs, Practice Fusion found the last few years difficult as competition expanded into their segment, from eClinical Works, drchrono, athenahealth, and NextGen to small practice packages from Epic and Cerner.

It should be noted that Practice Fusion in 12 years went through 13 funding rounds, raising almost $158 million from a long list of VC luminaries such as Kleiner Perkins, Artis Ventures, Founders Fund, and Qualcomm Ventures (Crunchbase). However, it disappointed its investors and Wall Street, which expected two years ago a $1.5 billion IPO. The $100 million from Allscripts is all cash and the price is “subject to adjustment for working capital and net debt”–an exit which was surely not the sugarplum in the eyes of its 2014 and prior  investors. CNBC

The Theranos story, ch. 17: closing the barn door after the horse

[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Yak_52__G-CBSS_FLAT_SPIN.jpg” thumb_width=”150″ /] And it may work, though the horse is in the next county. Late last week, with American eyes elsewhere, Theranos announced that they hired two executives with regulatory responsibility–a chief compliance officer and an VP regulatory and quality–and formed a new board committee focused on same. The CCO is Dave Guggenheim, the former assistant general counsel for regulatory law at HIT/medical distribution giant McKesson. The VP, Daniel Wurtz, comes from a similar senior director position at biotech Thermo-Fisher Scientific.

The country maxim, ‘closing the barn door after the horse has bolted’, applies. In fact, the horse is in town and having a growler of beer at the local tavern. The Newark, California lab is shut and the principals, including the CEO Ms Holmes, are technically prohibited from operating a lab for at least two years (that means you, Ms Holmes) starting in a month. Messrs Guggenheim and Wurtz (or similar) should have been on board years ago. Even small companies in our field realize they HAVE to do this!

This also doesn’t affect the interesting interest that DOJ and SEC have in Theranos. [TTA 10 July]

However, this Editor will take the contrarian view that somehow, some way, the ‘fix’ is being worked out, if not in. Don’t make reservations for the fire sale quite yet. The ban on Ms Holmes won’t take place for another month, minimum. That gives time for David Boies, their legal supremo, and his firm to stall for more time, and time for some calls to ask favors from friends, of which he has many in this administration. More than likely, Boies on behalf of Theranos will appeal the CMS rulings to an administrative judge. Ms Holmes may take the hit, but may get a handsome payday to depart despite her reported control, if the investors can salvage something out of the company.

At HQ, they may be rehearsing saying ‘mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa’ three times, kneeling deeply, in preparation to Going Forth And Sinning No More.

The Object Lessons taught by the Theranos Troubles, to us in healthcare tech, continue.

WSJTheranos Hires Compliance, Regulatory Executives  (more…)

Epic Systems getting into the app store business (US)

Epic Systems, the #1 company in the hospital and large practice EHR business, is launching its own app store, reportedly within a few weeks. This opens up interesting possibilities not only for mHealth app developers–who need application standards and guidelines soon–but also for Epic’s reputation as a closed system that shies away from interoperability with other EHRs like Cerner, Meditech and McKesson–a serious wrinkle with their Department of Defense EHR joint bid with IBM to replace AHLTA. The HIT Consultant article quotes a leading Epic customer consultant on that the first apps will be clinical, then crossing over into consumer; the latter seems an obvious move with PHRs (personal health records) as part of Meaningful Use requirements.

Philips, Salesforce dive into health data integration

Philips Healthcare and Salesforce announced last week their partnership to construct a connected, multi-point and collaborative data platform to benefit providers, payers and patients. The initial step is the launch later this summer of the Philips eCare Coordinator app for healthcare providers and a patient-centered Philips eCare Companion app, which will uptake data from Philips Healthcare medical devices into a variation on the Salesforce1 cloud platform. What’s emphasized in the releases and information from media sources is that it will be designed as an open platform for other device and software providers. (Data security problems down the line are anyone’s guess.) While Philips’ global CEO was part of the announcement and it’s expected that Philips will be lead dog for this, the only two customers mentioned were US and Salesforce’s. There were also few details on how clinical staff would access and use the data.

Cui bono from this? Philips of course, which of late has been lagging (more…)

Disruptive innovation in healthcare hasn’t begun yet: Christensen

Clayton Christensen, as many of our readers know, pioneered a theory of disruption in business models and a three-step cycle of innovation (empowering, sustaining and efficiency, now quite broken indeed). With two other writers, he applied these theories to healthcare in the 2009 book ‘The Innovator’s Prescription’ which this Editor heard co-author Jason Hwang, MD present in 2009 at the Connected Health Symposium and at a private meeting in 2011. One would think that we’d be well into disruption, which is part of the empowering innovation cycle and which the authors championed in the book as underway.

The surprise at the end of this Mobihealthnews article on his recent presentation at “Better Health” in Boston, a McKesson-sponsored meeting series, was not what constitutes disruption, but that it has not really started yet, four years later. This will be much to the surprise of many successful and unsuccessful companies (Misfit ShineZocDoc, Zeo, 23andMe) and health plans which have stoutly touted their products and services as The True Disruptors. Sorry, you may be only a part of the Big Shift: decentralization. Decentralization will push out parts of healthcare off the hospital (more…)

Cancer patient app grant to Partners HealthCare

This may be the first app to assist with patient cancer management of symptoms, medication and side effects. The Center for Connected Health division of Partners HealthCare in Boston is developing an app targeted to oral chemotherapy patients to better monitor their symptoms, adverse treatment effects and improve medication adherence. The research is being funded by a grant from the McKesson Foundation’s Mobilizing for Health initiative. The smartphone app will be tested for three months with a group of 104 patients at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. Features include self-care strategies for symptom management, a medication tracking device which also provides feedback on symptoms, strategies to prevent side effects, patient education and psychosocial support.  CCH release, iHealthBeat