Dive Brief:
- Oscar Health, a health insurance startup, is raising new financing that could boost its value to $3 billion, Fortune reported. Fidelity is the lead investor with $150 million in capital.
- Co-founded by venture capitalist Joshua Kushner, the company has raised more than $300 million so far from firms, including Google Ventures, Goldman Sachs, and Founders Fund.
- Oscar only provided health insurance to people in New Jersey and New York when it was established in 2013 but has since expanded to California and Texas.
Dive Insight:
Oscar has a mobile app that simplifies the insurance enrollment process, and facilitates communication between members and providers, along with free on-demand telephone consults.
Last year, Oscar partnered with Misfit Wearables, distributed free wearable devices to members, and paid them $1 for every day they walked a certain number of steps. Nearly 66% of their customers have participated in the program, walking 2.5 billion steps between December and April 2015, as reported by Fortune.
The company says membership is up seven-fold from 17,000 members in early 2015 to 125,000 members. However, Fortune argues the company is unprofitable, "as one might expect for a startup in the low-margin health insurance sector."