Cigna Innovation Challenge participants identify transformational solutions for diabetes care

GlucosePATH, Pack Health and SNAQ awarded

MATTER, the premier healthcare incubator and innovation hub, and Cigna, a global health service company, recognized three standout companies from the 2021 Cigna Innovation Challenge. In late December 2021, finalists in the inaugural challenge presented their solutions focused on empowering people living with diabetes to reach their optimal health. The startups that stood out focused on addressing health equity, supporting positive lifestyle choices and navigating external influences.

Coming out of the closing session, GlucosePATH, Pack Health and SNAQ all received a monetary prize for demonstrating how their solutions will transform the lives of people living with diabetes.

The multi-phased innovation challenge kicked off in August 2021 and saw 64 applicants from around the globe. From that, 12 companies participated in the incubator that focused on collaboration with key stakeholders at Cigna, a robust curriculum developed by MATTER and Cigna mentorship connections. The accelerator phase brought forward six companies and provided ongoing mentorship, tailored support and deep-dive curriculum. A final presentation demonstrating next steps for each solution culminated the program.

This collaboration between Cigna and MATTER enabled both companies to advance their goals of transforming diabetes care and bringing together industry leaders and entrepreneurs to accelerate healthcare innovation, respectively.

“At Cigna, we are committed to bring innovative health solutions to market that help to transform the way our customers receive healthcare, and this collaboration with MATTER provided a great opportunity for us to hear from companies looking to do that in the diabetes space,” said Mimi Bright, product strategy principal, care management solutions, Evernorth, the health services business for Cigna Corp. “Together, the systematic approach to identifying solutions and bringing them through a structured process provided incredible insights into how startups are approaching some of the most challenging topics in diabetes care and management. We are excited about the outcome and impressed with all the participants.”

“The systematic approach to identifying solutions and bringing them through a structured process provided incredible insights into how startups are approaching some of the most challenging topics in diabetes care and management.” – Mimi Bright of Evernorth, the health services business for Cigna Corp

Dr. Bradley Eilerman, CEO of GlucosePATH, expanded on the program experience: “We had an incredibly positive experience working with our partners at MATTER and Cigna. Throughout the process, we found the mentors and subject matter experts to be encouraging, insightful and very patient-centered. Sharing values of bringing effective and personalized care to people with Type 2 Diabetes confirmed our mission as a company.”

“Sharing values of bringing effective and personalized care to people with Type 2 Diabetes confirmed our mission as a company.” – Dr. Bradley Eilerman, CEO of GlucosePATH

When industry-leading organizations embody innovation and startups embrace guidance from those experienced organizations, such collaboration can lead to rapidly affecting actual change in the healthcare space.

“The collaboration between MATTER and Cigna was exemplary throughout,” said Steven Collens, CEO of MATTER. “The cross-functional team at Cigna included mentors as well as other team members who are invested in organizational innovation. MATTER brought industry experts and curriculum to bear, and the startups in turn were enthusiastic participants. I’m delighted that we have identified these three terrific startups focused on transformational change for people living with diabetes.”

Dhiren Patel, Senior Vice President of Pack Health shared, “We’ve done programs like this before, but what really set this one apart was the amount of hands-on time we got with the Cigna and MATTER teams. Each time we left a meeting, we received valuable feedback on how we could further tailor our solution. The amount of collaboration had us feeling very prepared.”

“We’ve done programs like this before, but what really set this one apart was the amount of hands-on time we got with the Cigna and MATTER teams.” – Dhiren Patel, Senior Vice President of Pack Health

SNAQ CEO Aurelian Briner stated, “[Coming out of this program,] we are very focused on listening to people with diabetes and their unmet needs around meals. And with multiple releases each week, we try our best to make new features available quickly.”

This innovation challenge has prepared each entrepreneur with a strong foundation to grow and scale their business. Moving forward, they will take this experience and their learnings from it to continue iterating their solutions to improve the lives of those living with diabetes.

Learn more about the companies

GlucosePATH — Celebration, Florida
GlucosePATH was developed based on a common interest between a physician and a computer scientist to help patients find affordable and effective treatments for Type 2 Diabetes. Through this process, they have leveraged powerful computational tools from the travel and finance industries to help clinicians and patients sort through the thousands of treatment pathways for individualized solutions.

Pack Health — Birmingham, Alabama
Pack Health is an evidence-based patient engagement platform that changes health behaviors to close gaps in care and improve outcomes like addressing chronic conditions, comorbidities and social determinants. It’s the proven patient engagement solution that provides member-first care, reduces costs and is designed to scale.

SNAQ — Zurich, Switzerland
SNAQ helps people living with diabetes take the guesswork out of mealtime decisions. The award-winning app helps count the carbs, protein and fat content of meals by snapping a photo and supports learning how to keep glucose levels in target range after meals. SNAQ connects to popular glucose sensors and diabetes apps like Dexcom, Abbott, Medtronic, mySugr, Sugarmate, Tidepool and more.

About MATTER

At MATTER, we believe collaboration is the best way to improve healthcare. The MATTER collaborative includes more than 200 cutting-edge startups from around the world, working together with dozens of hospitals and health systems, universities and industry-leading companies to build the future of healthcare. Together we are accelerating innovation, advancing care and improving lives. For more information, visit matter.health and follow @MATTERhealth.