Zombies Stalk the Health Care Landscape!
Accenture, the management consulting firm, has concluded that the flood of venture capital into digital health startups is not only maturing, it has created a race of zombies that will be bought up on the cheap by established players. In language not usually employed by the elite ranks of sober-minded management consultants:
Accenture predicts that more than half of digital health start-ups funded between 2008 and 2013 are not likely to survive longer than 20 months. Some healthcare companies will look to buy these “zombie start-ups” to drive growth by infusing top talent, fueling innovation and bolstering existing solutions.
While digital health and healthcare IT start-up funding is accelerating, the reality is that few start-ups will stand out. Even fewer will survive. Of the nearly 900 digital health start-ups that Accenture studied, 51 percent are zombie start-ups, at risk to die. These are companies that each received less than $50 million in total funding between 2008 and 2013 and have not received funding in 20 months or more.
Companies that received less than $50 million, and haven’t received funding in 20 months? That’s is some rather odd criteria.
I’d like to think that some of these “stand out” based on how novel their product is; not by how much money is being poured into it. For the sake of argument, let’s say I invent an iPad or Android App that can be used to monitor Grandma, after she’s been discharged from the hospital. It could connect via Bluetooth to a heart monitor, a breathing monitor, maybe a fancy mattress pad to determine her sleep. It could alert her to take her meds, and she would have to press a button to record the times she took them. She could use a panic button to call a nurse allowing a nurse could check in on her in real time. Something like this could keep her out of the hospital. On the other hand, having yet another FitBit wristband heart rate monitor pedometer for the few people out there who want to monitor their physical activity is not going to stand out.