Philips acquires Medumo, a Boston-based start-up focused on the patient experience

The Dutch technology conglomerate Philips has acquired Medumo, a young healthcare company specializing in health care.

Medumo uses a combination of e-mail and SMS to convey instructions to patients on behalf of its hospital clients. The company, which has fewer than 30 employees, is part of the so-called "Patient Engagement" trend of providing medical service providers with tools to stay in touch with their patients outside of the four worlds. walls of the doctor's office.

For Philips, the acquisition could be an opportunity to create a service for its pre-existing healthcare system customers.

Philips is on a series of acquisitions for its health care portfolio, which includes a variety of products for hospitals, such as medical devices, imaging systems and alarm systems, in order to 39 to help doctors manage the most critical patients. Several months ago, she acquired Carestream's health informatics business to complement her radiology computer operations. In 2018, she also recruited a handful of other health companies in areas ranging from sleep and respiratory care to next-generation biosensor technology.

Philips and other traditional health technology providers could face increasing competition with giants of traditional technologies such as Amazon, Apple and Alphabet. These technology companies are developing all of their own health-related businesses, ranging from consumer-smart watches with health monitoring capabilities to computer systems designed to help clinicians complete patient medical records.

Among Medumo's partners, the Boston Children's Hospital, which stated that hospitals were losing billions of dollars each year due to missed appointments, improper preparation of the procedure, or lack of money. exit instructions. His other major client is Harvard Hospital's Brigham Health Hospital, which recently claimed that Medumo was one of its best startups. One of Medumo's initial applications is to guide patients through a colonoscopy, which allows them to understand how this "tells you about your poo".

The financial terms of the agreement have not been disclosed.

Phillips sent an internal memo announcing the deal on Wednesday, but did not disclose the acquisition to the public.

A spokesman confirmed: "Philips has signed an agreement for the acquisition of Medumo, an American start-up in the healthcare sector, which will bring an advanced offer of patient diagnostic management (DPM) to the portfolio. growing digital diagnostic services from Philips ".

They added, "Through Medumo's software application to remind and prepare patients for pre-exam tasks, we improve the connection with the patient and his care, while improving operational outcomes for patients." our clients."

Philips explained that it was making acquisitions as a "supplement" to fill specific gaps in its portfolio.

Medumo, which debuted in 2013, created a small seed in 2018. He is a graduate of Silicon Valley's accelerator program, Y Combinator, and MbadChallenge's health technology program in Boston.