In the fast-growing, service-on-demand industry, can health care be left far behind? Well, not anymore.
Uber’s cofounder, Oscar Salazar, has raised $14 million to expand his new health care venture Pager, a doctor-on-demand service, which is currently serving New York City and soon plans to expand to San Francisco and Los Angeles.
The investment money has been raised from Ashton Kutcher-owned Sound Ventures, New Enterprise Associates, Goodwater Capital, Lux Capital and Montage Ventures, according to Forbes.
The new app-based service, which promises a doctor’s visit within two hours of a request, charges $50 for an urgent care visit and $200 for any visits after that, $100 for a physical and $25 for a phone consultation. The service is currently being offered out of any insurance network.
“Pager is focused on delivering a broader range of care options on demand” than exist today, Pager’s CEO Gaspard de Dreuzy told Forbes. “It could be a tele-consult via phone or messaging or an in-person visit in the home or a referral to the right specialist. We like to think of ourselves as the Amazon for health care.”
The on-demand service might aspire to be the Amazon of health care, but its business model is certainly built up more in an Uber-like style.
The service locates and verifies doctors in its network and automatically bills the patient’s credit card associated with the Pager account. Just like Uber’s five-minute cancellation policy, which charges app users for canceling past five minutes of ordering, Pager charges a $10 cancellation fee for canceling an appointment more than five minutes after requesting it.
While Pager might be yet another on-demand service in the market, it is also an addition to Salazar’s growing list of Uber-like companies trying to disrupt various industries.
“I don’t build companies. I help people build companies,” he said. “It’s part of my strategy to work with companies like Uber because I can do my job faster, and I want to have value to add.”
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