PolicyBazaar's DocPrime to invest $15 million in healthcare

New Delhi: PolicyBazaar’s healthcare venture, DocPrime, has earmarked $15 million to invest in preventive healthcare over three years, a top executive said in an interview.

DocPrime, launched in August this year, provides online consultation and allows users to book appointments with doctors and diagnostic labs through it’s platform. The company claims to innovate using artificial intelligence and machine learning on it’s platform.

The investment comes after DocPrime received an initial internal funding of $50 million ( Rs 362 crore) from parent company PolicyBazaar Group in September this year.

“The plan is to invest 30% of the total money in building the healthcare business,” chief executive officer Ashish Gupta told Mint.

DocPrime has over 20,000 doctors and 5,000 diagnostic labs on board currently. It facilitates more than 4000 online conversations through it’s chat bot, with an average conversion rate of 4-5%.

The company plans to launch a subscription-based product or specialised insurance product for out-patient department services to help users cover costs of check-ups, tests and other facilities within a fixed monthly package. DocPrime will launch packages starting from Rs 250 per month for a family in January 2019.

DocPrime is in advanced talks with three leading health insurance providers to offer it’s OPD specific insurance on it’s platform, Gupta said requesting anonymity since the deals haven’t closed yet. To be sure, PolicyBazaar (run by Etech Aces Marketing and Consulting Pvt Ltd) gets 20-25% business from selling health insurance products.

The average ticket size of transactions through the chat bot ranges from Rs 6,000 to Rs 10,000, against Rs 10,000 to Rs 20,000 per transaction from the retail channel, according to Gupta.

DocPrime is looking to bring more than 40,000 doctors and 20 hospital chains within its fold by next year. The company, which competes with the likes of Practo and 1MG, is targeting an annualised revenue run rate of Rs 10 crore.

Gupta added that the med-tech company will focus on dental services, including regular monitoring, and offer dental procedures. “We wish to have a large network of 2,000 dentists and strategically align the progress of this segment with the business” Gupta added.

Also read: Policybazaar delays IPO plans, parent launches healthcare business

DocPrime, which is currently building its B2C business, will also focus on selling its products to businesses and corporates. It expects corporates to contribute 20-30% to the company’s total revenues going forward.

The company is trying to replicate the success of Ping An’s Good Doctor, a Chinese healthcare services firm, which went public in Hong Kong in April and raised $1.1 billion. Ping An’s Good Doctor is backed by PolicyBazaar’s new investor SoftBank and is currently the world’s largest doctor consultation business.

PolicyBazaar achieved unicorn status after it raised more than $200 million in funding led by SoftBank Group’s Vision Fund, Mint reported in June.

Disclaimer: This information has been collected through secondary research and IBEF is not responsible for any errors in the same.