Amazon and One Medical merger set to make healthcare “accessible, affordable and even enjoyable”
E-commerce giant Amazon has entered into a US£3.9m mega deal to acquire One Medical, an IT-driven primary care company based in San Francisco.
One Medical provides in-person, digital, and virtual care services which, it says, aims to improve the healthcare experience for its customers.
Amir Dan Rubin, One Medical CEO, commented: “The opportunity to transform health care and improve outcomes by combining One Medical’s human-centred and technology-powered model and exceptional team with Amazon’s customer obsession, history of invention, and willingness to invest in the long-term is so exciting.
“There is an immense opportunity to make the health care experience more accessible, affordable, and even enjoyable for patients, providers, and payers. We look forward to innovating and expanding access to quality healthcare services, together.”
Amazon has been a big investor in healthcare over the past few years, and news of the merger is one of its biggest statements yet that it plans to be a big player in the provision of both telehealth and in-person care.
“We think health care is high on the list of experiences that need reinvention,” commented Neil Lindsay, SVP of Amazon Health Services.
“Booking an appointment, waiting weeks or even months to be seen, taking time off work, driving to a clinic, finding a parking spot, waiting in the waiting room then the exam room for what is too often a rushed few minutes with a doctor, then making another trip to a pharmacy – we see lots of opportunity to both improve the quality of the experience and give people back valuable time in their days.
“We love inventing to make what should be easy easier and we want to be one of the companies that helps dramatically improve the healthcare experience over the next several years. Together with One Medical’s human-centered and technology-powered approach to health care, we believe we can and will help more people get better care, when and how they need it. We look forward to delivering on that long-term mission.”
Under terms of the merger agreement, which is subject to customary closing conditions, Amazon will acquire One Medical for US$18 per share in an all-cash transaction.
Amazon states that its vision is to be ‘Earth’s most customer-centric company” and aims to make it easier for customers with disabilities to enjoy everything it has to offer across its devices and services.
Most recently, these have included improving accessibility features on its Alexa service to assist people with visual impairments, including a Show and Tell feature for its voice-command technology, and a Text Banner for its Fire TV device.
In 2019, Amazon announced that it had partnered with the Department of Health in providing NHS-verified health information and advice from devices which have the company’s Alexa technology.
