Tthe U.S. Patent & Trademark Office (PTO) has agreed to move forward with Teladoc’s case to invalidate a patent held by rival American Well Corporation
Source: hitconsultant.net
From American Well CEO, “Understandably, Teladoc has its back against the wall. The company operates a phone-a-doctor service and is now required by state and federal regulation to pivot into live video doctor visits, where you can see the doctor. This has been our field of operation for almost a decade and where we hold 26 patents granted to us by the US Patent office. We understand that Teladoc needs to contest our patents and welcome the patent review, which we never opposed. To be clear – American Well holds the patents and Teladoc is asking for their review. There is no news here.”
The American Telemedicine Association projects there will be 800,000 telehealth consults in the U.S. in 2015; Teladoc is expected to conduct more than 525,000 of those consults, almost twice the amount of the rest of the industry combined.