MIT Sloan Management Review Article on Health Care Platforms Need a Strategy Overhaul

To succeed, digital health platforms must shift their approach in three key areas.

The market for digital health services is growing rapidly. Worth more than $175 billion globally in 2022, it is expected to have a compound annual growth rate of 27% until 2030.1 Digital health services are provisioned over platforms that match patients with medical professionals while integrating artificial intelligence, telemedicine, and data analytics to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of health care delivery. Despite attracting both users and venture capital (with $45 billion in funding in 2021 alone), digital health platforms struggle to match the success of other platform businesses, with many failing to achieve profitability.

Health care around the world is beset by major challenges, including increased demand for services, barriers to access for marginalized groups, and growth in health care expenditures as a proportion of gross domestic product (accounting for 18.3% of GDP in the U.S. in 2021).3 According to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, digital health platforms can help address these challenges and more.

About the Author

Marcus Holgersson is a professor of industrial management and economics at Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden. Joakim Björkdahl is a professor of strategic management and innovation at Chalmers University of Technology. Anna Essén is an associate professor at the House of Innovation, Stockholm School of Economics. Johan Frishammar is a professor at entrepreneurship and innovation at Luleå University of Technology in Sweden.

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