Going Global

By Jeff Arnold, CEO and Chairman

As part of our Healthways population health acquisition in August, we maintained their position in Healthways Brasil Servicos de Consultoria Ltda., a Brazil-based joint venture and innovation lab in partnership with the largest independent insurer in Brazil, SulAmérica. As we continue to cultivate opportunities for Healthways and Sharecare, I traveled to Sao Paulo last week to meet with the SulAmérica leadership and our team in Brazil, and left very impressed and inspired by what we can accomplish together.

Our team there is making striking progress toward helping Brazilians take control of their health, particularly in how they are leveraging existing infrastructure in a country where  – even though universal healthcare is provided by the government – there are great challenges when it comes to the actual delivery of healthcare. We believe that technology can help bridge that gap, particularly when you consider that of the 55% of Brazilians who have access to the Internet, 85% of them are accessing it on mobile phones. Therefore, as we extend the Sharecare platform to the smartphone, we have an unprecedented opportunity to enable more than 100 million Brazilians to get all their health in one place, right on their mobile phone in partnership with Sharecare and SulAmérica.

While I unfortunately have not had the opportunity to learn how to speak Portuguese, last week, one thing was never lost in translation – and that’s the passion and enthusiasm that SulAmérica and Healthways Brasil have to empower people to live their healthiest lives. We are excited about the role Sharecare can play in making that a reality for Brazil – and the rest of the world – as we roll out more products and services outside of the United States, like the smoking cessation mobile app we launched today in France.