Rip Road Files IPO Prospectus: Empowering 'Smart Patients' Through Personalized Mobile Health Engagement

It is natural to seek medical attention when ill, which is our customary practice, as professional physicians can provide accurate diagnosis and treatment, thereby improving health outcomes and alleviating the burden of disease. However, one point that many people often overlook is: As patients, what can we do for our own health? For instance, could we start by cultivating healthy lifestyle habits? Indeed, to achieve a healthy and high-quality life, we must first learn to become informed and proactive patients, and Rip Road is here to assist you. So, what exactly does Rip Road do?

Company Introduction
By developing personalized health management programs, Rip Road enables healthcare providers and health plans to engage patients via mobile devices, helping them better understand individualized care plans and proactively manage their own health. Rip Road helps providers improve patient outcomes by encouraging treatment adherence and promoting positive behavioral changes.

(Figure: Rip Road's customers)

Over the past five years, Rip Road has been at the forefront of the mobile health movement. The company has developed a proprietary technology platform for patient management programs, enabling payers and healthcare providers to engage patients through mobile devices via multiple channels, including SMS, email, MMS, interactive voice response (IVR), push notifications, mobile apps, and mobile websites. Protocols initiated by healthcare professionals, combined with intelligent algorithms, ensure the delivery of the right information to patients at the appropriate time and through the optimal channel, thereby addressing the unique needs of each individual. Rip Road facilitates communication between patients and healthcare providers, encouraging patients to take a proactive role in managing their health, adhering to treatment plans, and maintaining regular, healthy lifestyle habits.

Generally speaking, patients often lack a comprehensive and accurate understanding of their own health status. The so-called "smart patient" refers to those who have a good understanding of their health condition and treatment plan, consciously and proactively seek the information they need, take active steps to improve their health, and adhere to their treatment regimen. Rip Road aims to help patients become more proactive and engaged in managing their health. Given the high prevalence of mobile devices today, it is certain that the Rip Road service platform can bring significant convenience to patients in managing their health and effectively enhance their engagement.
Four Key Features of Rip Road:

◆Patients: By developing personalized programs, patients gain a more detailed and comprehensive understanding of relevant diseases or health information, thereby enhancing their engagement and empowering them to take a more proactive role in managing their own health.
◆ Healthcare Providers: Help healthcare professionals improve patient health outcomes, enhance customer loyalty, and intervene to modify patient behavior.
◆ Health Plan: Providing customers with tools and resources to actively engage in managing their own health, thereby enabling them to enjoy a healthier lifestyle.
◆ Government: Capable of assisting the government in public health education, promoting health awareness, enhancing patient engagement, and improving patients’ lifestyle habits and overall health status.

Product Introduction
Rip Road’s current services include diabetes care, asthma management, prenatal care, adolescent health, and influenza prevention.

Men’s Pregnancy Program (Future Dad Project)
This program includes a series of tools designed to help expectant fathers engage in their wives' pregnancy journey.


◆ Countdown Timer: Let expectant fathers know how much time is left until the due date.
◆ Support Meter: As the pregnancy progresses, this tool helps expectant fathers understand what kind of support their wives will need.
◆ Contraction Timer: Helps expectant fathers track the duration and interval of their wives' contractions, and can also be used for recording.
◆ Pregnancy Imaging Capture: Helps expectant fathers capture images during pregnancy, and also record audio and video for them to save as mementos or share with family and friends.
◆ Physician Guidance: Detailed record of the doctor's instructions and advice; also serves as a log for expectant fathers to note any concerns and questions for discussion at the next medical visit.
◆ Announce the Birth: After the baby is born, this tool provides expectant fathers with a quick and easy way to share the good news with others.
◆ Support Team: Bringing together all key physicians and professional healthcare providers in one place.
◆ Checklist: If you need a list of tasks to complete before your baby is born, this is the perfect one for you.
◆ Binder: Used to search for any data obtained using the above tools, facilitating easy retrieval.
◆ Quick Facts: Provides information on the expectant mother and baby, along with explanations of relevant terms, to help expectant fathers gain a clearer understanding and better grasp of the situation.

Diabetes Programs (糖尿病服务项目)
This program provides a range of education and support to help patients with diabetes better manage their health conditions.



◆ Send text messages to patients’ mobile phones based on each patient’s individual circumstances and specific needs. The message content includes health information, glucose monitoring reminders, and supportive features that encourage patients to take action to improve their health status.
◆ By collecting and analyzing user responses to short messages, third-party data sources, and recommendations provided by clinicians, the program establishes a comprehensive personal profile for each patient.
◆ Data and information generated by users throughout the program’s usage are compiled and organized to track patient progress and differentiate individual patient profiles, thereby determining the content of SMS messages sent to each patient and enabling a personalized, exclusive service experience.

Adolescent Health Program (青少年健康项目)
This is a comprehensive, interactive educational program for adolescents that primarily provides targeted responses to their questions via anonymous text messaging.



◆ The company’s Q&A platform enables adolescents to receive timely responses from healthcare professionals. For physicians, questions are analyzed and categorized, effectively improving their response efficiency.
◆ Teenagers can also subscribe to the Healthbyte service to receive weekly educational text messages, which are automatically tailored to their age.
◆ The platform will also remind adolescents to take their medications as prescribed and attend appointments on time, while providing them with test results.

Asthma Alerts (哮喘提醒)
This project provides SMS alert services for asthma patients, particularly those who are highly sensitive to environmental triggers that can exacerbate their condition, such as individuals with pollen allergies.


◆ SMS reminders.
◆ Conduct testing and notify users of pollen density levels and other environmental triggers.
◆ Customized services tailored to client needs.

Prenatal Care Program (Maternal Health Program)
Provide educational counseling services for expectant mothers, including customized pregnancy planning.


◆ Send SMS reminders to customers based on prior appointments, including health tips, guidance on vitamin intake, and reminders to stay hydrated.
◆ Healthcare professionals maintain close contact with users via the platform, monitor their health status, and review historical records.
◆After the user gives birth, push notifications automatically switch to postpartum-related information.

Influenza Program (Flu Service Program)
Rip Road collaborated with Columbia University to launch this project, which tracks influenza outbreaks through large-scale population sampling, enabling healthcare providers to maintain close contact with patients at potential risk.


Rip Road’s innovation lies in its reliance on accurate and reliable SMS functionality, combined with extensive collection and analysis of personal data, to deliver personalized and exclusive services tailored to each user. Furthermore, it emphasizes the importance of patient engagement by guiding and educating patients, thereby enhancing their participation. This approach ensures that every user recognizes the significance of managing their own health, equips them with the necessary self-management skills, and encourages proactive involvement in improving their well-being.

Technical Support
The Rip Road data platform intelligently processes and transforms complex medical knowledge and reliable mobile technologies, delivering a personalized, high-quality user experience while facilitating management for physicians and clinical healthcare providers. Built on an intelligent interactive engine, the platform tracks each user’s individual circumstances throughout their engagement, then selects content tailored to their specific characteristics based on these tracked records. Every message sent undergoes rigorous validation to ensure medical credibility and compliance with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). Rip Road aims to provide users with a personalized, private SMS service that genuinely drives behavioral change, while supplying vendors with rich data insights.


Key Technical Features:

1. Basic Functions
Appointment reminders, medication alerts, and customized SMS ringtones can all be seamlessly integrated with the company’s platform. A unified portal is provided for healthcare service providers to facilitate management, while also allowing patients to select from multiple intelligent information reminder services.
2. Patient Management Program
Rip Road will establish deeper management interactions with patients. By analyzing patient-reported data, daily routines, and externally integrated metrics such as step count and distance traveled, the platform categorizes patients and automatically delivers tailored information to each individual. As patients’ conditions evolve, the program will be dynamically adjusted to continuously meet their changing needs.
3. Integration Capabilities – API and Customized Development
The company’s platform is designed as a standalone solution capable of integrating with existing systems, providing interfaces for real-time communication gateways and access to patient interaction histories. Its API functionality evolves continuously alongside the platform to identify new services that better align with user needs. Backed by an experienced team of developers and technical experts, the company strives for excellence in project research and development, continually integrating additional digital solutions.

Team Introduction
Eric Leven, the company’s head, holds a bachelor’s degree from Dartmouth College, an MBA from Columbia University, and an MSc from the London School of Economics and Political Science. He previously worked at AT&T, the second-largest mobile carrier in the United States, and Cingular Wireless, the second-largest wireless carrier in the United States, where he mentored numerous startup ventures. He pioneered the SMS aggregation business in the U.S. and participated in the development of the universal short code system. He also helped Cingular launch video services and established a dedicated partnership with HBO.
At the age of 12, Eric began suffering from severe headaches. Following a particularly intense episode, he underwent surgery after being diagnosed with a subdural hematoma. Since then, he has come to understand the importance of monitoring his health and has proactively pursued a healthier lifestyle.
To date, the Rip Road team has been dedicated to research and development in the field of mobile technology for over nine years, achieving the following results:

◆First launch mobile data and multimedia services in the United States;
◆ Developed the largest interactive SMS program in the United States for the “American Idol” show;
◆ Developed mMode and Ogo;
◆ Developed a location-based SMS mobile application that provides turn-by-turn directions via text messages;
◆ Produced the first streaming video for HBO, playable on mobile devices.

(Editor: Zhang Nan)

For more information on VCBeat’s “Series Report: 30 Most Worth-Watching Healthcare Startups of 2015,” please click the link “Series Report: Master Index”