Oura announced the acquisition of medical AI chatbot startup Counsel Health for $625 million during its quarterly earnings call. The deal is expected to close before year-end.
Counsel Health operates as an "AI-native primary care company" that delivers AI-generated responses based on users' health data from wearables, with the option to escalate conversations to in-house physicians. Oura added Counsel's chatbot to its app earlier this year before formalizing the acquisition.
Oura CEO Tom Hale told Bloomberg the deal connects wearables, clinical AI, and doctor access based on biometric insights. The combined offering will focus on three areas: preventative care, acute care for episodic health concerns, and specialty and chronic care for reproductive and cardiometabolic health.
Counsel Health currently operates a physician network of approximately 50 doctors. The startup's 70 employees will join Oura as part of the deal. Counsel CEO Muthu Alagappan is becoming Oura's chief clinical AI officer and plans to expand the physician network.
Oura says Counsel will continue offering its medical AI platform to external enterprise partners, including health plans, health systems, consumer health organizations, and employers.