New York City-based Cedar has struck a $425 million deal to buy Ooda Health, a healthcare technology company. A press release issued on Thursday (May 13) said that Cedar will now “address the full set of challenges consumers face when paying for healthcare.”
Cedar, which offers a healthcare-focused financial platform, said that 84 percent of U.S. adults are worried about paying their medical bills in the next year, and that one in 10 consumers simply won’t pay their bill if they don’t understand the administrative process. That’s according to the company’s 2020 Healthcare Consumer Experience Study, conducted by Forrester Consulting, which surveyed over 1,500 American healthcare consumers.
“We believe that by bringing our companies together, we can identify new opportunities to help consumers — as well as payers and providers — navigate an increasingly complicated healthcare system,” said Florian Otto, CEO and co-founder of Cedar. “Cedar’s mission has always been to transform healthcare and deliver the best possible financial experience for consumers.”
“Payers and providers recognize the importance of working together to fix the broken consumer financial experience,” said Seth Cohen, co-CEO and co-founder of Ooda Health. “We’re tackling healthcare administration and billing head-on by building the most comprehensive technology and services platform for providers and payers.”
The Cedar and Ooda boards have approved the transaction, which is expected to close this month.
Cedar announced in March that it had wrapped up a $200 million financing round that valued the company at $3.2 billion. The round, led by Tiger Global Management, included existing investors Concord Health Partners, Thrive Capital and Andreessen Horowitz.
“Cedar has emerged as the market-leading, technology-enabled platform helping patients resolve their medical bills in ways that are easier and more relevant, resulting in improved financials for healthcare providers,” said Scott Shleifer of Tiger Global Management.
In an interview with PYMNTS, Otto said medical practices that use Cedar’s payments platform report a 96 percent customer satisfaction rate, which often means speedier payments from patients.
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