As part of our partnership with MassChallenge, we help support startups through Microsoft software, mentorship, networking, and more. With the launch of PULSE@MassChallenge, an incubator for digital health startups, in 2016, we’re excited to take our partnership one step further and support innovations in healthcare. Through PULSE, we are partnering with four digital health startups this year, providing resources to drive the healthcare space forward through technology.
Below, we spotlight PULSE startup Pillo Health, a personal home health care robot for adults with chronic illness.
What is your startup’s mission?
To empower adults living with chronic conditions to live healthier and more independent lives.
Give us your elevator pitch in 280 characters or less.
Pillo Health is an in-home digital care management platform that provides personalized care for adults with chronic conditions. We use interactive and engaging companion robots that store and dispense medication, guide and educate users to follow provider-directed care plans, generate actionable health data, and connect patients to care teams and caregivers.
How are you using technology to empower others?
Pillo Health helps healthcare organizations and caregivers cost-effectively leverage data analytics, artificial intelligence, voice-first technology and facial recognition to improve care delivery and management in the home. Pillo generates actionable health data [from inside the home] to be shared with care teams and caregivers (including family members.) The Pillo device, referred to as a digital assistant or robot, accompanies individual patients at every point on their care journey, dispensing medication, providing assistance with complex medication regimens, guiding and educating users on provider-directed care plans and encouraging adherence to medication and treatment. Unlike other in-home digital care management products, Pillo develops personal relationships with users, proactively engages them into take responsibility for their care , and serves as an extension of provider care in the home,o – all with the goal of improving personal and population health outcomes and ensuring peace of mind.
Why did you apply to Pulse at MassChallenge?
To support our mission and to accelerate our market entry.
How is Microsoft helping you further your mission?
By providing optimal and proven systems that help us deliver reliable, scalable and secure products and ensure ease-of-use in the marketplace.
What is your favorite part of your product/service?
The science and creativity behind the development of our Pillo devices, and knowing these robots will serve as companions that can truly make a difference in the lives of people who use them.
What does the term “health tech” mean to you?
Any platform, software or technology that improves long term health outcomes.
Emanuele Musini, CEO, Pillo, is a serial entrepreneur. It is from this entrepreneurial upbringing, and from the loss of his father due to medication non-adherence, that the idea for Pillo was born – the need for an intelligent healthcare assistant that allows people to better manage their own health and the health of their loved ones. Prior to launching Pillo, Emanuele founded businesses in Italy including an artisanal food gift sharing platform and a producer of premium Italian truffle products. In 2008 he opened the U.S branch of Tartufi di Fassia, which he built to become one of the largest importers of truffle products in northeast United States. He has lived between Italy and the U.S since. Emanuele (known by his friends as “Ema”) has a degree in Media & Business. At the age of 24, he became executive producer for leading Italian advertising production company. He was also a Partner in Tenuta di Bagnoli Energy, a large player in the bio-energy sector in Northern Italy.