Apple Said To Have Acquired Another Digital Health Startup

Apple is serious about helping people get healthier.

Subscribe to the Crunchbase Daily

The tech behemoth recently acquired Tueo Health, a Redwood City-based digital health startup for an undisclosed amount, according to a CNBC report citing “a person familiar with the deal” and other outlets. (When we say recently, it’s believed the acquisition actually took place in late 2018, according to CNBC, but was only recently leaked.)

Founded in 2015, Tueo Health raised a known $1.1 million in funding over its lifetime, according to its Crunchbase profile. The company, whose name comes from the Latin word “meaning to observe, care for, and maintain,” is focused on asthma management.

According to this interview conducted by Stanford University with two of the startup’s co-founders, Tueo’s “system includes a non-contact sleep sensor and a smart phone application that given [sic] parents access to data and guidance about their child’s condition.”

We’ve reached out to Apple and will update the story if the company gets back to us.

Presumably, Apple is interested in incorporating the startup into its products and most likely into the Apple Watch.

According to CNBC, Apple has only made two other healthcare-related purchases, including the 2016 buy of Gliimpse and the 2017 acquisition of Beddit, a sleep sensor maker.

Below is a chart of the number of known startup acquisitions the Cupertino-based company has made since 2011. CEO Tim Cook told CNBC earlier this month that Apple actually has been buying companies “every two to three weeks” and “has acquired 20 to 25 companies in the past six months.” However, Apple has notoriously kept quiet about many of its purchases, explaining the deal count difference between what Crunchbase has on record and what Tim Cook has told the press.

As you can see in the table below, the company has announced (or leaked) five known acquisitions since the beginning of this year alone, according to Crunchbase data. In March, it picked up Laserlike, a machine learning startup that helps deliver user-specific content. And in February, Apple acquired not one, but two, startups: PullString (formerly ToyTalk), an eight-year-old AI voice startup, and UK-based DataTiger, a three-year-old digital marketing startup.

As Apple continues to attempt to diversify and not be so reliant on iPhone sales, we expect we’ll continue to see more acquisitions of startups, especially those focused on services, in the near future.

Disclosure: The author’s husband works for Apple in the Austin office.

Illustration: Li-Anne Dias