Kakao Ventures into Mobile Healthcare... Blood Sugar Management Service to Launch in Q3

Hwang Hee, CEO of Kakao Healthcare
Personalized Platforms for Individuals and Corporations to Launch Within the Year
Utilizing Big Data, AI, IoT
Aiming to Enhance Public Health

Kakao Healthcare will begin full-scale business expansion starting this year. It plans to provide a mobile-based personalized health management platform, including blood sugar management services, to individual users, and a healthcare data platform to medical institutions and corporations.

Hwang Hee, CEO of Kakao Healthcare, is making a presentation at a press conference held on the 2nd.
[Photo by Kakao Healthcare]

On the 2nd, Kakao Healthcare held a press briefing at its Pangyo office in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province, where it revealed its 2023 business mission and service launch plans.

First, Kakao Healthcare plans to offer digital healthcare services this year utilizing big data, Internet of Things (IoT), artificial intelligence (AI), and mobile technologies. Over the past year, the company has been reorganizing its structure, setting and segmenting business goals, and establishing partnerships with related organizations to provide customized services needed by users, hospitals, and corporate clients.

Providing Mobile Healthcare Platform... Blood Sugar Management Service to Launch in Q3

[Image provided by Kakao Healthcare]

First, it will offer a 'mobile-based hyper-personalized health management (virtual care)' platform for individual users. The aim is to build a healthcare ecosystem where medical consumers actively participate, improving medical accessibility and ensuring digital equity in the healthcare sector.

This year, the focus will be on diabetes, one of the representative chronic diseases, with plans to launch a blood sugar management service using continuous glucose monitors (CGM) and smartphones within the third quarter. The company explained that it is developing the mobile healthcare platform in collaboration with CGM manufacturers. The continuous glucose monitor collects blood sugar data for up to 15 days with a single application. Users can easily input data affecting blood sugar, such as exercise and sleep, using wearable smart devices and the mobile healthcare platform. The collected information will be analyzed using AI to provide guidance.

Kakao Healthcare aims to help users proactively manage their blood sugar levels and prevent related diseases such as hypertension through this service. In the long term, the company plans to expand the healthcare ecosystem by linking value-added services from startups related to various diseases with the platform.

Healthcare Data Platform for Medical Institutions... Developing Remote Intensive Care Unit System

[Image provided by Kakao Healthcare]

For medical institutions, research institutes, and corporations, Kakao Healthcare plans to provide a healthcare data platform. Initially, it will standardize clinical data and various medical records held by medical institutions to build a data repository. Additionally, it will provide solutions and platforms that facilitate the convenient use of AI and large-scale machine learning.

Kakao Healthcare will provide the data platform, while medical data will be directly owned by the medical institutions. The company expects that, in the mid to long term, the platform will create various added values such as activating clinical research, improving medical quality, and fostering technological innovation. Currently, it has launched a pilot project targeting major domestic hospitals and plans to introduce a system capable of processing large-scale hospital data to the market as early as May. To this end, Kakao Healthcare has signed business agreements with hospitals and healthcare-related startups and is collaborating with Kakao affiliates.

Meanwhile, Kakao Healthcare has developed a 'remote intensive care unit system (eICU)' that connects public hospitals around Seoul National University Bundang Hospital, enabling easy monitoring of intensive care unit status within regional hospitals. When necessary, it supports remote monitoring of patients' vital signs from the central center and facilitates collaborative treatment.

In addition, the company revealed that it is collaborating with affiliates and hospitals to develop a service that allows convenient hospital reservations and usage through KakaoTalk.

Accelerating ESG Management... No Entry into Telemedicine or Medical Device Business

Hwang Hee, CEO of Kakao Healthcare, is making a presentation at a press conference held on the 2nd.
[Photo by Kakao Healthcare]

Kakao Healthcare will also actively engage in ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) management activities. In September last year, in collaboration with Kakao, it launched the 'Breathing Exercise Service' to help the public overcome COVID-19 aftereffects. Kakao Healthcare plans to continuously introduce various ESG activities aimed at promoting public health through cooperation with its affiliates.

Hwang Hee, CEO of Kakao Healthcare, stated, "Kakao Healthcare's mission is ultimately to make people healthier through technology," adding, "We will fulfill our social responsibility as a member of Kakao by contributing to the improvement of public health in Korea and supporting the global advancement of K-Medical."

In response to a question during the Q&A session about entering the telemedicine business, CEO Hwang firmly stated, "There are no plans to enter." He also emphasized that there are no plans to enter the medical device business, such as digital therapeutics or wearable devices, for the time being.