Austrian startup hi.health raises $1 million investment

Vienna founded startup hi.health, a health platform that acts as an intermediary between customers of private health insurance companies and their services, has raised million dollar investment, Austrian media reported. The investment is lead by the local venture capital fund Speedinvest, with participation of the American fund Pacific 8 Ventures and the British fund Seedcamp. The total amount of the investment is undisclosed but according to the local media is in the mid seven-digit range. Reportedly the funds will be used to further expand their product and to enlarge their team that currently counts seven people.

Founded in July 2018 in Vienna, Austria by already proven entrepreneurs Frederik Debong, a former founder of mySugr, and by his friend Sebastian Gruber, hi.health is an innovative start-up, dedicated to personalizing healthcare pathways. hi.health provide a smooth and convenient way to work with user’s health insurance and to get the best fitting help for their condition. Technically, users can submit their invoices digitally, hi.health then takes care of processing, billing and customer service. The app doesn’t provide insurance; simply acts as an intermediary between customers of private health insurance companies and their services and the app takes commissions for that service.

Even though founded in Austria, the app is, for the moment only available in Germany. Since lunch in Germany, October 2019, the app has several thousand customers.

As Gruber explains for Trending Topics, their focus on Germany for the moment is only for the fact that currently, Germany is the most exciting market in Europe. This is because the Digital Care Act (DVG) has recently come into force: Among other things, this provides that doctors can prescribe smartphone apps for health promotion to their health insurance patients in the future.

“We are very early in a market that will be very dynamic. Other European countries will follow Germany’s example and the idea is to be at the forefront”, explains Gruber and adds:

“The area of ​​InsurTech and HealthTech is extremely exciting at the moment because there is insane dynamism in the market. There are many start-ups in the property insurance area, and there is still reluctance in the health insurance area. We are leading the way. This market will change a lot in the next few years”.

The funds, as he adds, will help the startup to further expand their product and to enlarge their team.

“We are very happy about this vote of confidence from the international group of investors, who is also at our side with strong expertise in the fields of HealthTech and InsurTech. This also enables us to significantly expand our team and expand the product further”, says Gruber.

The other co-founder, Fredrik Debong, says that his experience with Roche (he sold mySugr to Roche) made him see the positive effects new health technologies have and how they can be used to improve the access to the health system.

“I saw firsthand what positive effects new health technologies can have. However, access to these innovative technologies is often difficult. This is exactly where we start to improve access to the health system. In addition to the health sector, this requires experience and knowledge from the areas of finance, insurance and medtech – but above all an understanding of people”, says Debong.

For the investors, the huge interest in the app, as well as the experienced team of entrepreneurs, were the factors that made them support this new startup.

“Hi.health acts at the interface between digital health, fintech, and insurance. Each of these markets is already very exciting and growing, but the combination is unique. It was precisely this positioning in connection with a team of experienced serial entrepreneurs and a product that has the potential to positively influence the lives of millions of people that convinced us. We are proud to be on board and look forward to working with Fredrik, Sebastian and their team”, says Markus Lang, the partner responsible for hi.health at Speedinvest.

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