Dive Brief:
- Uber Health, the ridehailing giant's non-emergency medical transportation bid, plans to double in size this year, according to division head Dan Trigub. The two-year-old health team currently employs about 15 people.
- San Francisco-based Uber is currently hiring for almost 1,250 open roles. Six are for its health business, according to the company's careers page: an account manager and account coordinator on the business team; an account executive, account manager and senior enterprise account executive on the sales team; and a growth strategy summer intern.
- The planned expansion heralds a renewed investment in the multi-billion dollar NEMT market as Uber looks to recoup losses following a disappointing IPO in May.
Dive Insight:
The unit is hiring across a slew of positions and experience levels, from a low-level salesperson to peddle the Uber Health dashboard to clients to a high-level account manager with eight years experience in healthcare-related sales and five or more years of experience in personnel management. The open roles suggest the division is focusing on increasing revenue by expanding into new markets and locking down partnerships in the new year.
"We are excited to share that the Uber Health team will be doubling in size in 2020, and we have some fantastic roles now open," Trigub wrote on LinkedIn Sunday.
Uber reported mixed third quarter results in November, topping Wall Street estimates on revenue but losing more money on a per-share basis than expected. The ridehailing company, which doesn't break out Uber Health results in its filings, has struggled since a lackluster IPO in May and is looking toward NEMT in the lucrative healthcare industry to drive revenue as losses continue to mount.
Downstream costs of missed medical visits in the U.S. are estimated at roughly $150 billion annually, and 3.6 million people miss appointments due to lack of transportation each year, according to multiple studies. Traditional healthcare companies are looking to partner with NEMT players to reduce patient no-shows, recapturing lost revenue and helping patients, especially vulnerable low-income populations, adhere to a care plan.
Uber says it has about 1,000 partnerships across the healthcare landscape, including hospitals like BayCare Health System, Boston Medical Center, MedStar Health and the Cleveland Clinic (along with thousands of additional systems that use Cerner's EHR through an October integration with the IT platform).
Uber also announced a partnership with Ride Health, which offers a transportation coordination platform but contracts out its drivers, Tuesday. Uber drivers will be accessible on Ride Health's platform for Ride's health system customers, including Philadelphia-based Penn Medicine and North Carolina operator Mission Health, and payer clients in 10 states.
Uber generally focuses on the provider and employer spaces for growth, while competitor Lyft has targeted the government and payer spaces. Like Uber, San Francisco-based Lyft doesn't disclose specific numbers, but told Healthcare Dive last year it's netted "thousands" of partnerships in the industry since it jumped into NEMT in 2016. Those include a relationship with northern California player Sutter Health, solidified earlier this month to provide transportation for its 3 million patient population and 24 hospitals.
NEMT is also being woven into commercial health insurance plans and Medicare Advantage offerings, though the ROI is largely unproven in a healthier, commercially insured population. Last year, CMS injected more flexibility into what supplemental benefits could be offered in the privately run Medicare plans starting in the 2020 plan year, setting off a drag race between Uber and Lyft to snap up market share in the space.