Olio Gets $2.5m Seed Money To Develop Healthcare Collaboration Platform

Olio, a startup that provides an online collaboration platform that digitally connects hospital and physician teams with post-acute providers, has raised $2.5 million in an oversubscribed seed funding round.

The Indiana-based startup said it planned to use the money to scale up its technology, expand across the country and grow its marketing, engineering and customer success teams. Olio has plans to employ 80 more people in central Indiana by 2020, a statement said.

Improving clinical outcomes

In a press release, Olio explained that its secure platform enabled greater collaboration between acute and post-acute healthcare providers, so patients receive more coordinated care. It further said the platform gives hospitals, physicians, and their teams clear and immediate insights into their patients’ conditions across the post-acute environment in skilled nursing facilities, home health agencies, outpatient physical therapy, and other facilities to improve clinical outcomes while lowering costs.

Olio founder and Chief Executive Officer, Ben Forrest, said his company allowed health systems to improve clinical outcomes for their patients, and improve financial performance in value-based healthcare. “With this funding, we’ll further advance our technology that is enabling health systems and physicians to provide the highest quality of care as patients transition to care facilities outside of the hospital’s walls.”

The company said the seeding round was “concentrated in strategic seed investors who explicitly understand the complexity of the healthcare environment, the challenges ahead within the industry, and the challenge that Olio addresses.” It confirmed that one such investor was Innovatemap Ventures.

Innovatemap Ventures Chief Executive Officer, Mike Reynolds said Olio’s prospects excited him: “The most successful startups combine industry expertise with an exceptional digital experience. Olio’s timing is ideal to seize this market opportunity and fill a critical need by connecting a fragmented industry. I’m excited to see what successes are in store for them in 2019.”

The startup previously received funding from the Indiana Venture Capital Investment Tax Credit by the State’s Economic Development Corp, which is designed to support fast-growing Indiana companies, has partnered with “progressive Midwest healthcare providers, who are engaged in value-based arrangements including Medicare Advantage, Managed Medicaid, BCPI-A, ACOs, and other risk-bearing healthcare reimbursement models.”

1. Jamieson Kay, an orthopedic surgeon, said Olio was helping to solve a communication gap “that exists between physicians, hospitals, and post-acute healthcare providers. Olio enables Central Indiana Orthopedics to collaborate more effectively with caregivers across the patient’s entire episode of care. As a result, our patients receive the highest-level of coordinated care and Central Indiana Orthopedics can efficiently manage our patient population, their experience, and the overall cost of care.”

How Olio started

On its website, Olio says it started off as a consulting firm aimed at improving alignment between acute and post-acute providers.

“After saving providers millions and improving clinical outcomes, it was clear the market needed a lasting, scalable way to solve the communication puzzle in the episode of care. That’s why we created Olio, the first-to-market digital collaboration platform of its kind,” the company said.

Olio, which was formed in 2017, launched its technology platform in January of this year. The secure platform provides digital connectivity and real-time communication. With this assistance physicians can gain insight into their patients’ conditions. Using episode particular progress logs and care protocols, acute and post-acute providers can gain valuable insight and are best-placed to offer care to specific patients’ needs.

TLC Management Regional Director of Operations Philip Heer was quoted saying they were using “Olio to enable greater collaboration between our care team and our patients’ acute care teams. Our commitment to our patients’ health outcomes led us to use the Olio platform and we’re thrilled with the impact it’s having.”

Collaborative care platforms have been around for sometime now, an example being CipherHealth, which raised $36.7 million last year in funding. CipherHealth is a patient engagement and care coordination platform that brings together together technologists, clinical professionals, engineers, consultants, students, coders and researchers among others.