AgeTech

Don’t we already have technology to live our best life as we age?  Absolutely, as predicted in 2011, needs have been fulfilled, tech innovation has made it so. But do older adults know about it?  Could they afford it?  Could they deploy it in their homes? Will it enable them to age in place?  Do investors view the ‘best life’ suite of capabilities as an opportunity worthy of funding? The process of pitching one product at a time is well established – and innovators are comfortable with it, as are their judges.  But is that what older adults need?  Or would a suite of offerings, with deployment before the need becomes urgent, make more sense?  Here are the four blog posts from June, 2024:

Losses to scams continue to grow.  One wonders if there is an entire funding source somewhere that pumps money into new and scam incarnations – like the voice cloning scam (this is your panicky daughter! Send money!).  Around forever, though, remember the laundry list beginning with Medicare and Social Security (goal – get money), Publisher’s Clearinghouse (goal – identity theft) and many others per Google AI.  It all added up to $3.4 billion in 2023.

The 2024 media message touts aging in place. It’s what everyone wants to do, even those with homes that are difficult to navigate, long distances from family, and must have major modifications to enable remaining there. Yet you read this message nearly every week  -- Next Avenue lauds the benefits, sponsored by Lively from Best Buy Health.  Fortune tests home monitoring systems they say are critical to Aging in Place.  And USA Today publishes a survey that underscores the desire to age in place. So what is the market of tech that will support this goal?  AARP calls it AgeTech – and has a startup directory of new entrants, including categories of health, mobility, caregiving and more.  But that is a list, not a solution.

Older adults today are beneficiaries of widespread tech access. And it really does fulfill the 2011 prediction in the AARP report, Connected Living for Social Aging.  Broad access to online capabilities was imagined by experts when that report was written.  They knew that someday high speed Internet access, widespread use of social networks, online access to food delivery, health appointments, shopping, holding video gatherings with families at holidays – all taken for granted now, but then it was just a dream. The good news is that most older adults take advantage of these and many capabilities today. Internet access today is being delivered out to remote rural areas – and most of the 65+ will soon be connected. Then what is the next quality of life frontier for older adults?  

The month of May -- and the hostility about AI overflowed.  Given the pace of change in AI technology – both the software and its rate of adoption – it’s curious that recently the Wall Street Journal published an aging survey about what customers don’t use and/or like about chatbots. These observations include the usual: ‘hallucinated’ answers; lack of customer awareness that they are talking to a chatbot (really???); the chatbot is too nosy. Or it asked too many questions; or couldn’t handle two questions. Which would make this article, like much of media coverage of AI, sound negative. Too late, adoption happened anyway. This is a commentary, perhaps, on the nature of news media in general, who either are mirroring the AI skepticism in the public, or more typically promoting it. But clearly with chatbot adoption, the public is paying new attention. Sigh.  Here are the four blog posts from May, 2024: