A monitoring system designed to collect biometric data on outpatients with chronic diseases will be tested this year in hospitals in mainland China, announced in April 2018 Medopad, which initiated the program.
The British software developer is seeking long-term strategic investors in China to help fund pilot projects to be launched in 2018.
A digital platform to collect data from wearable devices
« China is the most important market for us by far, » Medopad co-founder and CEO Dan Vahdat said on the sidelines of the Boao Forum for Asia held from 8 to 11 April 2018 (source: Scmp.com). « We came to China four years ago to learn and make mistakes until we found the right partners. «
Medopad will set up an office in Shanghai that will house up to 50 staff, as part of a plan to boost global headcount by 10-fold to reach 500 in the next 18 months.
Data shared with hospitals, pharmaceutical and insurance companies
The company, which has operations in Europe and the US, aims to develop a digital platform in China to collect data from wearable electronic devices on patients suffering from chronic diseases.
This data will be shared with hospitals, pharmaceutical and insurance companies to save medical costs and improve treatment efficiency.
Medopad has signed trade deals worth £100 million in China
As part of Prime Minister Theresa May’s official visit to China in early February, Medopad announced that it has signed trade deals worth 100 million pounds (€114.5m; US$139m) with companies including computer giant Lenovo, China Resources Group and the China unit of British pharmaceutical group GSK.
The British group has also signed a cooperation agreement with Tencent Holdings on health prediction and has established a technology partner with online doctor consultations and health care products provider Ping An Healthcare and Technology, a unit of financial conglomerate Ping An Insurance.
Since the beginning of the year, Medopad secured US$28 million (€23m) of private equity capital. The company aims to raise in total US$120 million (€99m) in the coming months. Its current backers include German pharmaceutical giant Bayer, British medical insurance company Bupa and Hong Kong property group NWS Holdings.
A partnership with a dozen hospitals
The company plans to deploy its software in China later this year at more than 10 hospitals affiliated with Peking University and Capital Medical University.
Fees will vary according to the number of patients
These pilot projects will initially involve a few hundred patients, with a focus on those with Parkinson’s disease. Patient movement and reaction time will be measured to improve diagnosis.
Medopad charges annual fees that vary depending on the number of patients and functionalities, that are paid by insurers, pharmaceutical companies or patients.
According to Fabio La Mola, head of Southeast Asia life sciences practice at L.E.K. Consulting, health tech companies tend to charge low fees initially to encourage adoption of their technology, which will allow them to develop additional revenues sources.
« Monetizing [health data] can take over three years »
« The data is a gold mine when the sample is large enough, and can be combined with other data such as electronic medical records, clinical trials and insurance and reimbursement data, » he said. « Monetizing this data can take over three years as data on the same patient for a long time needs to be collected. »