Startup Stories: Helping Employees Navigate Their Healthcare Benefits

In this series, Karen Guzman talks to student and alumni entrepreneurs about how they are making an impact with their startups.

Founders: Guy Benjamin ’14, Ben Nagar, and Elad Ofir.

Venture: Healthee empowers employees to become informed healthcare consumers. Using Zoe, an AI-powered digital assistant, employees can search Healthee’s comprehensive platform to quickly find answers to their healthcare and wellness benefits questions. They can locate care, consult with virtual care providers, make informed decisions during open enrollment, understand billing, and more.

What was the moment when you had the idea for this startup?

While I was working at McKinsey, I felt it was easier to fly a fighter jet (which is what I did in my former career) than navigate my health benefits. It seemed that every time I had a question about my health benefits, I was sent to a call center. I realized that I was not a smart healthcare consumer, and none of us are. We’re not smart consumers because we don’t have access to the right data. We don’t know where to go when we need care. It got me thinking that there must be a better way to access health and wellness benefits, and that there is probably a way to leverage AI for this basic need that most people have.

What’s the problem you’re trying to solve or the gap that you’re trying to fill?

In America, 160 million people have a health insurance plan from their employer. Of those people, 70% say they don’t really know what they’re covered for, while 80% say they don’t understand basic terms such as “deductibles,” “out-of- pocket,” etc. And 50% of employees choose the wrong plan during open enrollment periods. Healthee is leveraging AI technology to help employees become smarter healthcare consumers.

What was the most important resource Yale SOM contributed to your startup? 

My most important resource is my network, and a large part of that network was established during my time at SOM. I probably leverage my network once every few days. Building a startup is hard. There are many times you feel like you’re failing, and having a strong network of supporters can make the difference between letting those failures affect you and being able to overcome them, look ahead, and focus on the next milestone.

The network is also helping me grow the company by connecting me to the right decision-makers in different organizations. Today thousands of employers are leveraging Healthee, and we look to continued growth.

What’s the biggest milestone your startup has hit since graduation?

Every day is a new milestone. There are many we’ve hit since starting the company. The biggest one is being able to attract and hire such amazing talent. We have very strong people who are not only making our company and product better but helping us create a winning team. In addition, we have hit a few other milestones such as raising $60 million in funding; signing up 500,000 users; closing our first seven-figure deal; and forging significant partnerships with large players in the industry. But none of these would have been possible without our first milestone—finding the amazing people who have joined Healthee.