Silicon Valley Entrepreneurship: Tendertree to build a self-help platform for elderly care

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Tendertree to build the self-care platform for the elderly

Sina technology Zheng from Silicon Valley, USA

"Sister Peach" is a good movie, but I haven't read it. See the old Yede with luggage, came to a strange old people's home, vacant looking at the small room, eyes show that helpless and lonely; I got up and crept out of the theater. Fear is because the thought of the mother in the country, the oceans can not be filial piety, when her life can not take care of themselves, how to look after?

I was impressed by the tender tree he founded when startups, the founder of the Silicon Valley business incubator, Andy Agwar Andy Agrawal. This is a San Francisco start-up company dedicated to building a home care platform for the elderly and the disabled to provide more intimate and customized services.

Tender Tree founder Agwar so to Sina technology to explain his entrepreneurial reasons: "We who do not have parents?" Who doesn't want the elderly to be better cared for? The social network is cool, but we can not live, and the elderly care is a problem we can not escape, it is a common social problem in the world. ”

This is the Indian software engineer Agwar 10 years after the first venture, 2001 graduated from the U.S. elite Mellon University, he has worked in Oracle, Mark logic and Sciable Labs, has been a software engineer.

San Francisco is a diverse city, Agwar from Indian families, and people of different nationalities and cultures need different nursing staff. After an unpleasant experience of hiring housekeeping, Agwar thought that he could build a platform of professional ability to combine the needs of care with the provider. In October 2011, he established tender tree in San Francisco with two partners such as Dana Wu (Dana Wu) and Allen Kim (Aaron Ginn).

Prior to the venture, Agwar conducted a market survey. According to his data, there are currently 4 million families in the United States needing care services, and each family spends 13,000 dollars annually on this. In other words, home care in the United States is a huge market of $52 billion a year.

"Our current care intermediary and a variety of pension villages are one-way services, information exchange is not sufficient, in this era of Internet seems very unreliable." The tender tree is to make the information on the caregivers clear on the platform, to see the main characteristics of each nurse, from what cultural background, what kind of training they have received, and to see the evaluation of their former clients, so that those who need service can choose the most suitable and reliable caregivers. ”

Open the Tender tree Web site, users can simply enter their own ZIP code to search for nearby caregivers information. Caregivers can register their biographical information on tender tree to find more home users who need care. Tender tree will conduct background checks on caregivers to ensure that the nurse is qualified and has no complaint record.

If they are Chinese-Americans, they can look for Chinese-American caregivers, and if they have a pet in their home, they can look for an animal care worker; If the old man likes music, he can look for dancing's nurse. All this can be matched by tender tree. In addition to communication between supply and demand, tender tree is also responsible for handling the insurance, payment and follow-up satisfaction survey services, the whole process of service.

As a result of the exemption from the intermediary link, tender tree's attendant fees will be significantly lower than the market price. In the San Francisco area, the cost of an intermediary to get a nurse is about $30 per hour, while the tender tree's carers charge an average of $15 per hour. If there is any dispute in the care of the loss, tender tree will be paid from the insurance, exempt the user's worries. Tender tree gets a 15% commission fee.

This May, tender tree joined the Silicon Valley incubator, startups. Under the guidance of many industry experts, the current number of users of tender tree has reached 2000 households, and shows a growing trend, the site June revenue reached 20,000 U.S. dollars, which means that the month through tender tree care turnover of more than 130,000 U.S. dollars.

"This is a huge untapped market and closely related to every family," said Dave McClure, founder of Startups David Maccu, when he spoke of tender tree. Tender tree has brought the care industry into the internet age, making it easier for families to find credible caregivers, and for good caregivers to serve more families. ”

Tender tree has completed nearly millions of dollars in funding. Agwar plans to further improve the information services for caregivers and gradually expand services to more cities in the United States. At present, tender tree's services are concentrated in 8 cities in the California Bay Area, with thousands of contracted nurse workers, who are expected to bring in 2000 dollars a year for each family.

Comments: China has stepped into an aging society, according to the National Bureau of Statistics, in 2020, China's 65-year-old population will reach 167 million, every 4 elderly people in the world have one in China. At present, the proportion of urban empty-nest elderly households in China is about 57%, the rural area is about 40%, and the aged population with no self-care is 15 million-20 million.

These elderly people need care and companionship, but many children are unable to accompany and care for the elderly because they are in an off-site or busy job, bringing a huge market for caregivers. Now Beijing and other big cities also pay more and more attention to the problem of old-age security, Beijing, 420,000 elderly and disabled people monthly payment of 100 yuan Old handicap service vouchers. and the professional nursing company such as Ching Chung has also been developing rapidly, and the number of services has soared 50 times times in two years.

But in the age of the Internet, the self-help Nurse website Tender tree provides a new way of thinking for the domestic nursing industry. This kind of social innovation model, I believe that domestic replication will be more welcome.