How 1mg Is Using AI To Achieve Scale And Solve The Access Problem In Indian Healthcare

- October 01, 2019

Beyond epharmacy, 1mg has expanded into doctor consultations and diagnostic lab services
As per DataLabs by Inc42 estimates, the total capital invested in epharma startups has been $361 Mn (2014-H1 2019)
1mg cofounder Gaurav Agarwal said the company has over 12 projects live that use proprietary AI and ML models

Online pharmacy startups such as 1mg, Pharmeasy, Netmeds and Medlife made medicines more easily available in a wider distribution area. On the other end, Practo, Lybrate, Portea, mfine, and DocsApp sprouted up in the telemedicine and diagnostics space to make access to doctors easier,and gradually, healthtech startups have changed the face of Indian healthcare over the past five years.

As per DataLabs by Inc42 estimates, the total capital invested in startups operating in the epharma space between 2015 to H1 2019 is $361 Mn. The total capital inflow in the online pharmacy startups combined makes up around 20% of the total capital invested in the healthtech startup sector of India ($1.77 Bn) in the same time period.

The ecommerce boom meant that 1mg could focus purely on building the right product, selection, pricing mechanisms, Agarwal said. And it also helped the company build the right operational systems after separating the identity from parent company Healthkart in 2015. “We wanted to make sure that the stuff that we promised gets delivered to users on time. All of these things contributed a little ways in getting us in.”

The company’s CEO Tandon said the Series D would help the company get comprehensive coverage across India in terms of supply chain, logistics and infrastructure, which would help it achieve this penetration outside the major metros and Tier 1 cities. And to get there it is also looking to invest in building its data science team for new products such as a digital doctor and AI-powered health bots. To solve access and availability of medicines, 1mg went to the core of AI models to find the solutions, Agarwal claimed

“AI is a poorly easily understood these days — everyone says they are using AI. But we are going beyond that. We were clear that this technology could change healthcare,” Agarwal said about the company’s plans to use artificial intelligence models to improve its services.

Agarwal and his engineering team had to understand how AI models work — the math behind it, as he puts it. “So today, even though our AI and machine learning team is small, we have over 12 projects live in our production systems that use AI and ML models.” He added that it’s not just about finding a model from the internet, plugging in the 1mg data, but fundamentally understanding the math and how mathematical models involved actually give 1mg the gain and value it needs.

They use AI today in improving user conversions;
They use AI to streamline delivery times and the logistics of that;
They use AI in doctor consults;
They use AI in disease progression models, so it’s quite an array of use-cases for them.

Courtesy: https://inc42.com/startups/how-1mg-is-using-ai-to-achieve-scale-and-solve-the-access-problem-in-indian-healthcare/