2015 was an intriguing year for technology and aging. The market opportunity has become more apparent, as the oldest boomers reached aged 69. Just for instance: there were multiple age-related fund launches; home care with tech underpinnings began to attract the lemming-like VCs; PERS offerings began to be integrated; speaking to devices (not typing) became increasingly possible; smartphones became tablet alternatives; senior housing organizations attempted re-branding of their offerings, likely to better match boomerdom. As we get closer to 2016 and summarizing key forward-looking trends, consider blog posts from 2015.
When firms collapse noisily, peers notice. Last week several firms commented (anonymously and by name) on the failure of Lively, a sensor-based home monitoring hub that tried too late to pivot into the PERS industry. Why do startups fail, anyway? In this industry, it appears more often than not that the founders believed they were different from the other players in the market (Lifecomm or AtGuardianAngel); that consumers would shop in BestBuy for an unfamiliar category (Wellcore); that a celebrity would make a big difference (Floh Club).
SAN DIEGO - December 3, 2015 - GreatCall Inc., the leader in creating usable technology for active aging, has acquired the assets of Lively Inc., a connected home health platform for older adults. The acquisition is a key step in GreatCall’s commitment to growth and the development of its connected health portfolio.
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz., Nov. 4, 2015 – Life365™ is proud to announce its official launch with formation of a new venture that plans to target unaddressed markets in the Smart Wearables space. Founder Kent Dicks, had previous success disrupting and bringing lower cost, mobile health technology products to the telehealth market – and plans to go to the next level, beyond hardware, with Rain™, a new dynamic Intelligent Wearables Platform that allows simpler, light weight technology solutions to be deployed to a broader audience.
Just as interest is heating up, could adoption stall? Turns out we’ve been in an innovators' bubble for Digital Health's Hype-and-Hope (HAH). Who knew there were 10 indicators of doom ahead? Stating the obvious, 'entrepreneurs are creating products patients don’t want to use' and there aren’t enough 'reimbursement incentives to drive providers to prescribe.' And those creating wearable and mobile variants seem to have missed sight of the target market – that is, boomers and beyond.
Some tech companies don’t see the senior market as an opportunity. They are the Peter Pan tech firms, the ones in which no one (including the customer) ever ages (you might know them as Facebook, Apple, Google, and Twitter). Meanwhile, from Nashville, France, and Germany, others see inclusion and extra services as good business, maybe because this market is pretty much ignored by the gang of four. Here are five companies that vary a platform or a product to make it more useful for an older adult market or service. – All material is derived from the vendor websites or press releases:
The medical alert industry chugs on…and websites mislead. [Rant on]Fear-based medical alert marketing enjoys robust web traffic, an enhancement to its senior-centric TV advertising. Searchers with an at-risk family member or who saw an older woman at the bottom of a TV staircase can find a plethora of matches. That particular you-know-who staircase vendor was founded in 1987 and salvaged a slogan from a defunct originator, adding the word 'help' in its next trademarked life. But by now, shouldn’t this market have been transformed by technology or undergone a business model change that would mandate a new name? Well, it truly was transformed by a technology – SEO. Go ahead, Google the term. The not-so-medical alert is an SEO marvel, injecting old content with fresh dates. As you scan the list, note multi-device review sites that appear to be pay-to-play, whether they are or not.
