Market research firm CB Insights outlined eight potential initiatives Google and its parent company Alphabet may take to enter the healthcare industry in a recent report.
"Google is betting that the future of healthcare is going to be structured data and [artificial intelligence]," the report reads. "The company is applying AI to disease detection, new data infrastructure and potentially insurance. … In short, Google seems to be going after the healthcare space from every possible angle."
Here are the eight potential entry points Google may take into the healthcare industry, according to the report.
1. Tackling specific diseases — such as eye conditions, diabetes, heart disease, Parkinson's disease and multiple sclerosis — from monitoring, to detection, to management
2. Creating data pipes to help healthcare stakeholders — such as hospitals and payers — access, organize and interpret information in an interoperable fashion
3. Pushing Google Cloud, in part by building more HIPAA-compliant services on top of the existing Google Cloud platform
4. Building healthcare datasets for third-party researchers; for example, Alphabet's Verily Life Sciences launched a longitudinal study called Project Baseline in April 2017
5. Developing AI-powered tools to support physicians, such as solutions focused on robotic surgery or clinical decision support
6. Developing diagnostics for patients, such as consumer hardware products for health screenings or voice-activated assessments via Google's voice assistant, Google Home
7. Rolling out population health interventions that target social determinants of health, such as food and transportation, alongside traditional healthcare
8. Exploring a Google-led insurance company, which might focus on detecting and managing customers' diseases using AI. CB Insights noted Verily is hiring for a health plan executive, and recent reports have suggested Verily is bidding for Medicaid contracts.
CB Insights hypothesized Google's most likely area for success is in the first and fifth use cases, augmenting physicians' ability to detect, triage and manage various conditions, while the firm expects Google to face more barriers developing hardware solutions.
"Google is working on so many initiatives focused on so many different facets of healthcare across so many areas of the company that the chances of failure are high," the report reads. "But so is potential for success."
To access CB Insights' report, click here.