Big Techs bet on healthcareBig Techs bet on healthcare

Until a few years ago, we wouldn’t have imagined that the so-called Big Techs would be so directly involved in the health sector. Today, these companies – Amazon, Google, Microsoft and NVidia – are competing with each other in some areas, but also adopting different strategies.

The Big Techs in Healthcare 2024 report by CB Insights pointed out, for example, that these technology leaders are aggressively adopting cloud computing and Generative Artificial Intelligence to solve problems in the healthcare area. The study analysed how these four giants are establishing their positions in this industry through strategic investments, partnerships and product launches, and how they plan to move forward in the near future.

According to the survey, the healthcare industry is valued at more than $11 billion and presents both opportunities and challenges for technology companies, from capturing the high volume of patient data to digitalisation initiatives and connectivity solutions, to name a few use cases.

Big Techs are using their offerings in areas such as cloud computing, hardware and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to serve healthcare providers and pharmaceutical companies. Here’s a summary of the approaches of Amazon, Google, Microsoft and NVidia gathered by CB Insights:

• Amazon is delving into primary and specialised care. Some of the main areas of activity are telehealth platforms and virtual specialised medical opinion solutions;
• Google is amassing a large volume of health-related data that could play an important role in its biotech bets. Google accounts for 90 per cent of Big Tech initiatives in the gene therapy market;
• Microsoft is empowering healthcare companies with AI tools to improve clinical trials, drug research and development, and the delivery of care services. The acquisition of Nuance, a provider of conversational AI and ambient intelligence solutions, for $19.7 billion remains one of the largest among Big Techs in the healthcare industry;
• NVidia is exploiting its dominance in hardware to play a major role in the future of smart hospitals. It has already overtaken the other Big Techs in terms of turnover in the healthcare segment.

Big Techs em check-up

Amazon is developing an ecosystem of primary care, pharmaceutical distribution and wellness tools through partnerships, investments and acquisitions.

Although it closed its primary care division for employers in 2022, Amazon has stepped up its activities in this segment through acquisitions and new products.

In the field of cloud computing, Amazon faces stiff competition in the healthcare sector, including in use cases that involve analysing patient data for risk analysis and clinical studies. Scalability, transparency and auditing features were singled out in the study as requirements where AWS fell short.

Google, for its part, is expanding its presence in the health area by developing an ecosystem of independent suppliers on its cloud platform, launching products that adapt Generative AI to health use cases and betting on biosciences through its venture capital arm, GV.

Google is looking for new ways to make health data interoperable. The mechanism used by Google is based on a unified horizontal data structure and a set of tools that independent software vendors can use to create new products for the healthcare sector. This data engine also ensures compliance with HIPAA (the US Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act), helping to reconcile, unify, eliminate source identification (for privacy reasons) and easily analyse data from various external sources.

More recently, activities related to the application of Artificial Intelligence in areas such as pathology and radiology have grown.

Microsoft is developing and hosting AI tools to make life easier for suppliers and help pharmaceutical partners get drugs to market faster. The Nuance acquisition brought Microsoft provider-ready AI tools integrated into the Big Tech ecosystem.

In addition, Microsoft is investing directly in AI solutions for the healthcare sector. Azure, on the other hand, has the appeal of easy data integration. Microsoft is also partnering with healthcare industry leaders to help with clinical research, drug development and smart hospital initiatives.

NVidia’s strategy centres on the development of advanced hardware and comprehensive AI solutions. Big Tech is reinforcing these offerings with investments and partnerships around the life sciences cloud, drug research and development, and surgical AI, with a focus on empowering smart hospitals.

NVidia sees opportunities in the areas of drug creation, surgery, medical imaging and wearable devices, but it is in hardware where its current advantage lies. In addition, NVidia is collaborating with early-stage start-ups to promote advances in the field of AI applied to medical imaging. It is also focussing on edge AI for surgical applications.