Courtesy Qualcomm
Qualcomm Ventures head of healthcare investing Thomas Kluz
- While technology has helped make life easier for professionals in everything from retail to transportation, it's taken much longer for healthcare workers to adopt new devices.
- What's keeping health-tech applications from taking off in doctor's offices is the unpredictability of internet service, Qualcomm Ventures' head of healthcare Thomas Kluz told Business Insider.
- "In a healthcare setting, the minute it doesn't work, you're never going to use it again," Kluz said.
For all the technologic advancements happening for consumers, it often feels like hospitals are stuck in the past relying on pagers and paper charts.
There's a fairly simple explanation for that, according to Thomas Kluz, head of healthcare investing at Qualcomm Ventures, the venture arm of $100 billion semiconductor maker Qualcomm. Qualcomm's healthcare investments include companies like Doctor on Demand and AliveCor, a company that makes a portable EKG reader.
The way Kluz sees it, something fundamental is missing that's keeping doctors from adopting new technology: reliable internet connectivity. So far, there are software systems like electronic health records and monitoring systems that are connected to the internet to keep healthcare providers on the same page. If internet cuts out in a hospital, the stakes are much higher than if you were to lose cell service while driving through a tunnel, for example.
"In a healthcare setting, the minute it doesn't work, you're never going to use it again," Kluz told Business Insider.
But there are some developments that could make connectivity less of an issue for hospitals. For example, 5G networks, which Qualcomm is working on, could be strong enough to provide service for parts of hospitals that haven't been able to get service using other networks.
"I think that technology infrastructure needs to be seamless and needs to work 100% of the time in order for the provider to really incorporate them into their day to day," he said.
For example, if the computer you worked on shut down every 20 minutes, you might opt for a different tool to help you be productive. "You're going to use something you can lean on and count on consistently," he said.
That's why Kluz is focusing in on making sure the foundation on which new medical technologies are built can be reliable.
"We need to take a step back, feed the core, and figure out how we can bring that best tech into work streams and just make it perfect," Kluz said. After a couple of years, the field could be ready to explode. "Then we're going to see a ton of equity values skyrocket in healthcare."
