It has been roughly a year since Ashu and I started mfine. During the course of this journey, we studied the healthcare sector very closely and started interacting with people in the ecosystem. The more we learnt, the more we got passionate about healthcare and at times obsessed with it!
Raising our series A is a huge milestone for mfine. We are excited to have Ritesh (from Stellaris) and Shripati (from Prime Ventures), as our partners going forward. We constantly draw from Ritesh’s deep knowledge of healthcare ecosystem and he has been supporting the company since we raised our seed round, last year. Shripati and team bring with them tech and product focus and the experience of building and supporting several successful tech startups.
The Healthcare sector is very complex and fragmented – not technologically per se, but the overall problem space is vast with many different players, different economic models, incentive structures and varied consumer behaviour. To understand this sector deeply, we went through several months of internal discussions, studied other markets and travelled to China, SE Asia and the US. We also spoke to a lot of consumers, doctors and hospital owners back in India.
We zeroed in on high quality and on-demand access to be at the foundation of what we would build. On-demand solves not just the convenience of access but also allows for early detection of issues, making it easier to track health and recovery. It makes follow-ups effortless, improves medication compliance and essentially puts a lot more control in consumers’ hands for managing their health. The message that ‘empowering consumers helps with better health outcomes’, is at the core of what we believe and want to drive across the ecosystem.
‘High Quality’ in healthcare often lead us to highly opinionated and perception-based debates. When we took a step back to think about this a bit more, we realized that hospitals are able to give holistic care to patients and that’s an important element of quality in healthcare. When we partner with reputed and standards-accredited institutions, the quality bar is already set very high. We figured that working with reputed hospitals helps us maintain quality and we reinforced this realization with a strong business model with hospitals as the providers.
When we started talking to doctors from these hospitals, we got incredible support, enthusiasm and even ideas on how a healthcare delivery app needs to work. We designed an AI system that’s learning medical standards, protocols and doctors’ diagnosis and treatment methods. It assists doctors by providing with all the data and analysis to do accurate diagnosis and effective treatment. The technology we build massively scales the quality and effectiveness of doctors and hence doctors are able to increase their reach and productivity.
Everything what we are doing, from product design, partnerships and overall operations are based on the above principles. We are effectively creating a ‘cloud clinic’ where quality healthcare can be accessed on-demand from anywhere. We believe we can scale this across the country and beyond to help people gain more control over their health. The new infusion of capital, brings us closer towards that vision.
Further Reading
Mfine Raises $4.2 Million in Series A; Aims to Redefine On-demand Healthcare Service Across India
http://www.primevp.in/announcements/mfine-raises
Author Prasad Kompalli Entrepreneur. Business leader. Health-tech evangelist.
These are just a few words to describe Prasad. Best known for his leadership role at Myntra, India’s largest e-commerce store for fashion and lifestyle products, Prasad has built and lead large teams from ground-up, in a career spanning more than 20 years.
As the Chief Business Officer of Myntra, Prasad led its growth from being a small ecommerce company to become the largest fashion destination in India, with a revenue nearing 1B. He was responsible for driving Myntra’s business across Category Management, Marketing, Fashion and Revenue. At Myntra, Prasad is credited for bringing several international brands to India, and creating a lasting impact in the industry by driving strategic partnerships and M&As. Prasad is also known to have lead Myntra through several technical innovations such as being mobile first, and creating opportunities at the intersection of data science and fashion. He has been instrumental in driving value creation through deep tech integration with partners in the fashion industry.
Prior to Myntra, Prasad had a long stint at SAP where he was leading an international team of 600 engineers developing key technology products in the areas of mobility, business process management and EAI. He was one of the top 200 global leaders at SAP where he held strategy and general management roles. During his time at SAP, he created several product innovations and has got eight patents under data and mobile technology.
mfine is Prasad’s second entrepreneurial venture, prior to which, he was the cofounder of Indus Bionics – an ambitious attempt to build indigenous low-cost cochlear implants.
Prasad is a big believer in tech-lead transformation of societies and strives to create positive impact for consumers, especially in India, with technology. He sees an unprecedented opportunity with mobile tech and AI to create a high quality healthcare experience that is personal and accessible on-demand. With mfine, Prasad wants to shape the new-age healthcare delivery in India.
Prasad also holds 7 patents in data and mobile technology.LinkedIn@pkompalliWebsite
