Move over, Amazon and Verizon. Another major consumer goods company, Best Buy, is jumping headlong into telehealth. And its latest addition of Current Health to its health division is a sign the home health space will become more crowded and diverse, according to a mergers and acquisitions expert.
“Over the last 18 months, we’ve seen patients quickly adopt telehealth as a supplemental aspect of service, allowing them to receive necessary monitoring, diagnosis and treatment that was previously inaccessible or completely unfamiliar,” Mark Thomas, a partner at M&A Healthcare Advisors told McKnight’s Home Care Daily Pulse. “Whether it be convenience, safety or preference by the patient, it is clear that quality of home-based services continues to improve while the demand for such makes the choice for at-home-care easier and easier.”
Best Buy announced Tuesday it had inked a deal at an undisclosed price to buy Boston-based Current Health, a remote patient monitoring and telehealth firm.
“The future of consumer technology is directly connected to the future of healthcare,” Deborah Di Sanzo, president of Best Buy Health, said in a press release. “We have the distinct expertise in helping customers make technology work for them directly in their homes and by combining Current Health’s remote care management platform with our existing health products and services, we can create a holistic care ecosystem that shows up for someone across all of their healthcare needs.”
The big-box retailer has been moving aggressively into home health over the past few years, notching up acquisitions. The retailer acquired GreatCall in 2018, a firm that makes cell phones, connected devices and provides emergency response services to seniors. It acquired remote monitoring service Critical Signals Technologies in 2019.
Other major consumer-oriented companies also have entered home care. Earlier this year, Verizon launched BlueJeans Telehealth. And Amazon said it would launch telehealth for its employees in all 50 states.
Best Buy hopes to close the Current Health deal by the end of its fiscal year in January.
