The GSMA mHealth Tracker currently lists over 900 global products and services. We’re tracking them across more than twenty filters ranging from where in the world they are to what business model is being used to fund them. There’s some interesting stuff in there. We’ll be updating with more searchable functionality later this year so keep an eye on the MDI website for regular updates. With this wealth of information at our finger tips you’d think it would be fairly easy to index the good, the bad and the ugly. We’re constantly being asked by our member mobile operators which products or services they should be looking at with a view at partnership. The sad thing is we haven’t been able to do that… until now.
Not too long ago an article was published by our good friends from Johns Hopkins University and the WHO entitled: “H_pe for mHealth: More “y” or “o” on the horizon?” They offer a tempered, yet somewhat optimistic view of the scientific landscape of mHealth evidence. That’s great for the medical community and tracks the historical evolution of medical devices globally. Here at the GSMA we’ve set ourselves a goal in 2013 for taking this a step further and trying to demonstrate the business case for mHealth in emerging markets. After a year spent identifying, validating and testing the value drivers amongst public and private stakeholder groups we know what this looks like in a spread sheet. We can finally argue a long term, shared value proposition.
But now the real challenge is taking those business cases, aligning to country specific health needs, negotiating with the consortia of partners, building out the win-wins for everyone involved and supporting the launch of services to a critical adoption rate. Mount Everest seems an easier mountain to climb. Watch this space in 2013 for stories of how organisations and companies move mountains to incentivise public and private stakeholders in emerging markets with oftentimes broken health systems to mainstream mHealth.