Beckers Payer
Jakob Emerson
October 18, 2022
Site Editor:
Joaquim Cardoso MSc
health transformation institute (HTI)
October 18, 2022
Apple will reportedly enter the health insurance business in 2024 in partnership with a major payer, reported Oct. 18.
CCS Insight’s chief analyst predicts the tech giant will power the new offering through health data collected by Apple Watches, such as blood pressure, blood oxygen levels, ECG readings and body temperature.
The analyst said having access to this data from the beginning gives the company an advantage toward entering the market and cutting costs.
CCS Insight’s chief analyst predicts the tech giant will power the new offering through health data collected by Apple Watches, such as blood pressure, blood oxygen levels, ECG readings and body temperature.
“They are in such a strong position to do this,” Ben Wood, chief analyst at CCS Insight, told Forbes.
“They’ve got a wealth of personal health data through Apple Watch.
If they join some of the dots together they can become a very competitive health insurance player and that potentially is going to have quite an impact on the structure of the healthcare market in the U.S.”
Apple’s services business currently brings in $20 billion a quarter — by 2030, software and services is expected to grow from a quarter to a third of the company’s revenues.
Originally published at https://www.beckerspayer.com on October 18, 2022.
Names mentioned
Ben Wood, chief analyst at CCS Insight
Apple Watch or Trojan Horse? [abstract from Forbes]
Such a move would raise questions over whether Apple launched the Watch with the long-term goal of entering the lucrative health insurance market. Wood doesn’t believe the Watch was launched with that ambition in mind, but that Apple now views it as a means to enhance its services businesses.
Wood said the Apple Watch started life as a fashion accessory, but that “Tim Cook pivoted Watch into the health and fitness space, and they hit an area that just resonated with consumers”.
“I don’t think it was a Trojan Horse to get into this, I just think it’s been a natural evolution. All of a sudden, they look at the data that they’ve got and they say ‘should we go into the healthcare industry?’.”
“Healthcare is a deep societal thing that Apple would like to fix,” Wood added.
Booming service business
The analysts predict that by 2030, a third of Apple’s revenue will come from software and services. It currently represents just under a quarter of the business.
