Amazon Closes $3.9 Billion Deal To Acquire One Medical (cnbc.com) 45
An anonymous reader quotes a report from CNBC: Amazon on Wednesday said it had closed its $3.9 billion deal for primary care provider One Medical. Amazon agreed last July to acquire One Medical to deepen its presence in health care, and "dramatically improve" the experience of getting medical care. Amazon has long had ambitions to expand into health care, buying online pharmacy PillPack in 2018 for $750 million, then launching its own virtual clinic for chronic conditions, and prescription perks for Prime members. The deal gives Amazon access to One Medical's more than 200 brick-and-mortar medical offices in 26 markets, and roughly 815,000 members.
The purchase was the first major deal announced since CEO Andy Jassy took the helm from founder Jeff Bezos in July 2021, and Jassy has indicated he sees health care as a major area of expansion. In a statement, he said health care is ripe for disruption, citing long appointment times and the complexities of primary care. "Customers want and deserve better, and that's what One Medical has been working and innovating on for more than a decade," Jassy said in a statement. "Together, we believe we can make the health care experience easier, faster, more personal, and more convenient for everyone." Amazon said it would discount One Medical memberships for U.S. users to $144 from $199 for the first year, regardless of whether they're a Prime subscriber.
The purchase was the first major deal announced since CEO Andy Jassy took the helm from founder Jeff Bezos in July 2021, and Jassy has indicated he sees health care as a major area of expansion. In a statement, he said health care is ripe for disruption, citing long appointment times and the complexities of primary care. "Customers want and deserve better, and that's what One Medical has been working and innovating on for more than a decade," Jassy said in a statement. "Together, we believe we can make the health care experience easier, faster, more personal, and more convenient for everyone." Amazon said it would discount One Medical memberships for U.S. users to $144 from $199 for the first year, regardless of whether they're a Prime subscriber.
They may not be able to force to be Prime subscrib (Score:2)
They may not be able to force to be an Prime subscriber in some states at all and in no way for pharmacy
Oh no... (Score:5, Funny)
I sure hope that patients don't have to use the Amazon site to search for medical services. If that's the case many will die - some of old age - trying to find what they're looking for. And all the while they'll be pushed to buy "Amazon's Choice" while they're learning about the wonders of Prime membership and getting to see which medical services other people "frequently bought together".
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Help will take even longer when it has to be purchased and delivered from China.
I have no clue why you were modded down - I'm still laughing as I write this. Maybe somebody thought you were making a political statement, and totally missed that you're talking about the amount of slow-boat-from-China merchandise on 'Zon.
More layoffs next year (Score:2)
"I take complete responsibility for growing too fast and not paying attention to the economic climate"
Maybe /r/antiwork is actually onto something
dystopia (Score:5, Insightful)
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If health insurance in this country cost the same as Amazon Prime, I'd actually have it.
Now that's dystopian.
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plan b puch that guy in the face and then buy law the jail / prison system will become your doctor with very low copays and if you are indigent then it's $0
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What's next, suicide booths?
Not too far off, actually. [bbc.com] Also, apparently searching for "suicide booth" triggers Google's help is available banner. I'm just going to take that as a sign that they're anticipating suicide booths becoming a thing, too. Either that or they think Futurama fans are prone to depression.
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It's a neat thought, but I just played around with it a bit.
It looks like that banner is triggered if the word "suicide" appears in a search and is only suppressed if "Suicide" is paired with something else common enough. And while it's a nerdy meme for those who remember Futurama, it isn't as common as, say, the movie "suicide squad".
Interestingly, it doesn't trigger for "suicide forest", IE Aokigahara, Japan, which is a forest noted for a LOT of suicides. As in at one point it was a rare day for the pat
Health care should not be about profits (Score:5, Insightful)
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Lose your job? Lose your medical coverage.
That's the idea. Can't make entrepreneurship too appealing because increased competition could cost the oligarchy some of their profits! Now, please resume toiling away so the person you're working for can become richer, citizen.
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One Medical is all about profits even before the Amazon acquisition. Its game plan is to allow the well off to buy more convenient service.
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Have you actually visited a One Medical office / doctor? They're my primary and I've visited a number of times. My experience has been:
- Immaculately clean, comfortable, and modern offices
- Super easy to see availability and schedule appointments via app/website
- The Dr. personally meets you in the waiting room **at the time of your appointment** (not a tech, nurse, or anyone else)
- They're paired with major hospitals and specialists and I've been able to get referrals with very short waits
They take most
Re: Imma Switch to Dr. ChatGPT. It's already bette (Score:2)
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I prefer Dr. Sbaitso [wikipedia.org], since he's always immediately available without any overloaded server errors. Plus he always keeps everything you tell him in strict confidence, so there's also that too.
The nightmare is slowly unfolding (Score:2, Offtopic)
How this company has been allowed to go so large and is allowed to keep on growing without getting their ass Sherman'ed, I'll never know.
George Orwell got it right apart from two thing: the date is off by half a century, and it's private companies enslaving the population, not the state. Other than that, it's happening...
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It's because the Sherman act isn't actually as comprehensive as you think.
Okay, the Sherman act prohibits "unreasonable" restraints of trade, and may break up companies that are large to the point of being a monopoly.
Note: Size is not actually in the act. Monopoly is. As such, getting larger by expanding their business portfolio actually reduces the possibility of a Sherman Act action, as opposed to complete domination of a field.
But here's the problem, as I see it: While large, does Amazon actually hav
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Where did they get the money for that? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: Where did they get the money for that? (Score:2)
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The end idea of this is actually to save money by reducing their healthcare expenses.
There's enough crazy inefficiencies with healthcare today that it is actually pretty easy to do if you work at it.
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That's a very interesting idea.
I know some large companies already "self insure" - they dont buy insurance and pay for the employee's treatments as and when necessary.
If you got 50k employees, you are probably saving millions in employee insurance payments and if not many need treatments/doctor visits, you can come out ahead.
Maybe the next step is to have your own medical system so you got all those medical services at cost for your employees, while still able to charge external patients market rate
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If you got 50k employees, you are probably saving millions in employee insurance payments and if not many need treatments/doctor visits, you can come out ahead.
My experience is actually mostly with military medicine.
Back in the '90s or so, the military was going to shut down most of its stateside healthcare facilities to save money.
However, military bean counters can do math, and quickly figured out that it would really massively increase expenses instead. Between 50 and 300%.
So they ended up spending the money to renovate the closed clinics and hospitals, hire the missing personnel, and open everything back up.
I'll note that I've read about some other humdingers
A ripple of fear runs through medicine... (Score:2)
The hospital and pharma lobbies don't fear socialism nearly as much as we traditionally think they do. Public-sector health systems are just another set of governmental rules that they can, just like all the other times, game and turn to advantage for themselves. What the medical establishment really fears is capitalist competition.
Walgreens? (Score:2)
Rather than the money-wasting acquisition of Whole Foods, which did not benefit Amazon or WFM in any way, why the fuck did they not just buy Walgreens instead? They have locations in all US cities, are in both health care and food markets, and are in horrendous need of being bought anyway by a company that actually knows how to run a retail business.
I would actually shop at Walgreens again if they were equipped with Amazon's just-walk-out cashier-less store technology. Plus it would cut Walgreens shopliftin
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lol ok bud. anyone who disagrees with you is clearly a russian bot. very original belief structure you have there...
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No normal person is more likely to enter a Walgreens if the cashiers are replaced by jackboots checking your registration at the door.
"Cashierless" won't even really save them much. The manager already doubles as cashier, and the cashiers double as janitors, stockers, and CSAs for all the miscellaneous services like passport photos and document scanning. Removing a femur from a skeleton crew makes the whole skeleton collapse.
Walgreens management might be bad, but at least it's not Amazon- or pete6677-level
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Go to an urban Walgreens sometime and tell me if this is a bad idea. I'd feel much better about shopping there with jackboots guarding the doors as opposed to zero security other than the bored disinterested cashier taking a long ass time to check out the 30 people in line. Keep employees for all the other duties but no more need for cashiers. As an added bonus, you'll get better employees once the work environment improves as a result of not having to deal with shitty drug bums stealing, assaulting, and ta