CI 304 Reporting and Communications of Intelligence Amazon Partnership Exercise Articles Apple Innovation Exercise Articles Presented by Heather Hallenbeck Academy of Competitive Intelligence 630.983.5530 www.academyci.com No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means – electronic, mechanical photocopying, recording or otherwise without the permission from the Academy of Competitive Intelligence and Heather Hallenbeck THE AMAZON APPROACH As Amazon enters new spaces, it follows a strategic playbook: First, Amazon introduces a customer-friendly product with a user experience and customer experience superior to that of its competition. This allows the company to build economies of scale, network effects, and leverage for negotiating with other parties (e.g. suppliers). Then, it invests in upfront fixed costs that allow it to function better and provide an outsourced version of services to its customers. We’ve seen this with Fulfilled By Amazon (FBA) and Amazon Web Services (AWS), which allow companies to use traditionally expensive services (warehouses, data centers, etc.) on a rent-to-own basis. By attracting enough users to a platform and offering its own outsourced services, Amazon can then standardize suppliers’ offerings on its platform. This allows it to create transparent and competitive markets for buyers and suppliers. Hiring Atul Gawande to lead its joint healthcare venture with JPM and Berkshire suggests a continuation of this playbook. Gawande is focused on using standardization as a means of scaling up healthcare, especially for relatively commoditized goods and services. Lack of standardization and focus on consumer experience has resulted in an incredibly fragmented, opaque market in healthcare, which makes the following particularly vulnerable to Amazon’s entrance: • Middlemen that are value extractors and have large profit margins • Companies that focus on formatting or coordinating information • Areas where customer experience has been an afterthought • Companies that have relied on opaque pricing as a business model 3 5/28/2019 Amazon Alexa celebrates HIPAA-compliant data transfer with six new healthcare skills | MobiHealthNews Amazon Alexa celebrates HIPAA-compliant data transfer with six new healthcare skills Developed by providers, payers and other stakeholders, each of the new voice-based services is designed tox) conveniently bring health knowledge and management into the home. By Dave Muoio (/content/dave-muoio) April 04, 2019 Earlier this morning, Amazon announced in a blog post that its voice-based Alexa platform now supports the development of software that communicates HIPAA-protected health information through an invite-only Alexa Skills Kit program. To kick off the new capability, the company also highlighted the launch of six new Alexa skills built by healthcare providers and other stakeholders. Each is designed to help members, patients and caretakers manage care at home with easy-to-use voice commands. “From our view, [Alexa’s data protection] makes for great opportunity in healthcare, because what we’re trying to do is make it easier for patients to access information, easier for patients to track their health and easier for patients to interact with their healthcare system,” Dr. John Brownstein, chief innovation officer at Boston Children’s Hospital, which released one of the six new skills, told MobiHealthNews. “Voice represents a great leap forward — as much as it is challenging for someone to log into their patient portal, download and train them in a mobile app, out of the box Alexa works. … It just makes sense to use these tools that are hands free and utilize the main modality that we use to communicate, voice, to improve care.” The six new Alexa skills are: My Children’s Enhanced Recovery After Surgery (ERAS) Boston Children’s Hospital’s newest voice technology tool helps parents understand and follow pre- and post-surgery guidance, as well as to understand their child’s recovery progress and manage upcoming appointments. The skill is currently being implemented at the hospital for patients receiving cardiac surgeries, although Boston Children’s said that it is hoping to expand the skill to include additional patient groups “in the near future.” Livongo Blood Sugar Lookup: A companion to the digital chronic disease management company’s Livongo for Diabetes program, the new skill allows users to quickly check the latest blood glucose reading taken by their device or their weekly average. According to the company, program members can also receive a selection of general health tips through their device. https://www.mobihealthnews.com/content/amazon-alexa-celebrates-hipaa-compliant-data-transfer-six-new-healthcare-skills 1/15 5/28/2019 Amazon Alexa celebrates HIPAA-compliant data transfer with six new healthcare skills | MobiHealthNews Swedish Health Connect A tool from the Providence Health system that allows users to find nearby Swedish Express Care Clinics and book same-day or next-day appointments at the organization’s urgent care locations. Cigna Health Today Designed for employees enrolled in a Cigna plan, the service helps users check in on their wellness program’s goals and access additional info on rewards and health tips. Atrium Health The health system’s skill allows patients in North Carolina and South Carolina find information about local care facilities —such as wait times, hours of operation, address and contact information — and book appointments. Express Scripts he pharmacy benefit management firm’s offering lets members track home deliveries of their prescriptions, with the option to receive a notification when an order arrives at their door. Why it matters The arrival of HIPAA-compliant data transfers to one of the world’s most popular voice assistant platforms sets the stage for a number of new voice-first products (http://ww.mobihealthnews.com/content/37-startups-building-voice-applications- healthcare). And while voice command-based tools have been pitched for stakeholders across the industry, these six initial skills highlight the impact this medium could have among consumers and patients. “We’re taking advantage of technology people already have,” Brownstein said. “How do we take advantage of the rising tide of adoption of consumer tech, and bring healthcare value to it?[By] not trying to invent things that are healthcare specific, but leveraging what consumers are already utilizing and already know how to use, and bringing healthcare through those platforms.” From consumer health advice to clinician tools, Amazon’s voice assistant has already seen a number of skills and services revolving around healthcare. Although the past year was chock full of pilots and early implementations, experts in the field have stressed that the technology is only just expanding beyond its “first wave”of reactive health information services to become a more and more proactive tool. On the Record "We believe voice technology, like Alexa, can make it easy for people stay on the right path by tracking the status of their mail order prescription, helping us further solve the costly and unhealthy problem of medication non-adherence,” Mark Bini, VP of innovation and member experience at Express Scripts, said in a statement. https://www.mobihealthnews.com/content/amazon-alexa-celebrates-hipaa-compliant-data-transfer-six-new-healthcare-skills 3/15 WHY IT MATTERS Amazon Alexa can aid doctors during surgeries 24 Mar 2019 NEW YORK: Amazon Echo with in-built Alexa or Google Home smart speakers can not only play your favourite songs at home but can also assist doctors during medical procedures, say researchers. Smart speakers can be programmed to act as an aid to physicians in hospital operating rooms, researchers said on Saturday during the Society of Interventional Radiology's annual scientific meeting in Austin, Texas. Smart home speakers offer a conversational voice interface that allows interventional radiology (IR) physicians to ask questions and retrieve information needed for their patient treatments without breaking sterile scrub. During treatment, IRs rely on nuanced medical information delivered in a timely manner. "When you're in the middle of a procedure, you need to remain 1/7 sterile, so you lose the ability to use a computer, Kevin Seals, MD, a fellow in interventional radiology at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). A team of doctors perform a surgery. Photo: Reuters. This smart speaker technology helps us to quickly and intelligently make decisions relevant to a patient's specific needs, added Seals, who is also the lead author of the study. To reach this conclusion, the researchers at UCSF developed a device-sizing application for the Google Home smart speaker. The application processes questions from a human voice and provides recommendations on the precise sizing of medical devices. There are hundreds of devices, with more being introduced every day, making it difficult to determine the correct sizing or materials needed in every circumstance. "This technology allows physicians to concentrate more closely on the care of their patients, devoting less time and mental energy to device technicalities," noted Seals. In developing the application, size specifications were acquired using literature reviews for 475 IR devices, such as catheters, sheaths, stents, vascular plugs and others. "Further research will look to provide information from electronic health records and patient clinical data, such as allergies or prior surgeries," said researchers. Amazon has explored getting into consumer health diagnostics - testing for disease at home Christina Farr CNBC 14 December 2018 Amazon 's secretive special projects group has considered products for consumers to conduct medical tests in the home, which could take the company into the health diagnostics space, according to a person familiar with the company's plans. Two people say the company was in discussions this year to buy a venture-backed diagnostics start-up called Confer Health, but those talks did not result in a deal. Via its web site, Confer develops hardware for at-home tests starting with fertility and infections like strep throat.