Berlin-based startup Clue, whose app launched in 2013, has raised a total of $30.3 million in multiple fundraising rounds. The mobile app harnesses science and data to create actionable personal insights into women's health.
Co-founder Ida Tin started from the observation that in the 60 years since the first commercialization of the contraceptive pill, no major innovation has taken place in this area. What if technology could come into play?
Clue, what is it? Here are some clues!
The mobile application has positioned itself as a menstrual cycle tracker and an aid to contraception and fertility. The application is available in more than 190 countries, 15 languages and would count according to it 5 million active users. The application is based on three main technologies: machine learning, big data and the cloud. Clue should offer hardware in the future, in particular the use of wireless sensor network technology.
The Clue app can be used with or without creating a user account:
Without account (opt out): data is stored locally on the user's mobile, some features and data recovery are impossible. Data is not shared with any third party.
With account (opt in): data is stored on social media marketing service Clue's proprietary servers. Personal data collected is anonymized and is used for research by partner universities such as Oxford University and Columbia.
Cycle tracking apps are the second most downloaded category after running apps in the fitness and health category of the App Store. There are currently around a hundred mobile apps on this topic on the French store. What signals are currently being sent to the connected health market and what strategies can emerge there?
Connected health: an attractive market!
According to Statista, the global digital health market was valued at $60 billion in 2013 and is expected to quadruple by 2020, reaching $233.3 billion. The market is expected to be driven in particular by m-health, connected health through mobile phones, wireless health, which includes all uses of wireless technologies for health, and finally telemedicine, which refers to the use of NTIC to enable the practice of medicine remotely. The m-health market segment is expected to generate $55.9 billion in 2020.
The cult of the “quantified self”, already a consumer habit…
Self-measurement, "quantified self", was not born with digital technology. However, digital technology has allowed its generalization and sharing. This term refers to all the methods and technologies allowing the user to measure their personal data to better manage themselves. This can include the management of their productivity, their well-being or even their health. The emergence and success of applications allowing users to monitor their health are inseparable from the acceleration of the phenomenon of self-measurement.