e-Therapeutics Healthy at Consumer Electronics Show: Abbott Labs (ABT)
Welcome to the 11th episode of the Brookside Research podcast!
Hosted by: Alec Foege, Director and Founding Member of Brookside Research and Jonathan Blum, Managing Editor of News and AI.
This Week: New Value in Therapeutic Consumer Tech
A growing online reputation has its benefits: For the first time in over a decade – thanks to these podcasts, it appears – we were offered insider access to the The Consumer Electronics Show, the annual Las Vegas retail gadget usually called CES. We are never shy to take a fresh look at any darn thing, We dug into the latest electronics aimed at retail users: Consumers electronics that aimed to cure cast a healthy glow.
Not Big-7 Tech
Big Tech likes to play the role of virtual healthcare provider. Google, Apple, and Microsoft all offer therapeutic-based services to consumers. Google has Google Health and Google Fit. Apple has Apple Health App; Microsoft loves its Azure Health Services.
But business success has been weak for health techs. Profits are challenging. Regulations are complex. And healthcare data carries real operating risk. European consumer rights groups accused Meta of “massive and illegal” health data collection. The U.S. Security Exchange Commission fined health-tech startup GoodRx $25 million for violating privacy.
The 2017 legal decision “Dinerstein v. Google” shows just how easy it is to get on the wrong side of collecting a consumer’s health data.
Abbott Labs’ Lingo continuous glucose monitor aims at improving health with body data.
A Healthy Start with Lingo
Where big tech won’t go, little tech is happy to innovate. Abbott Labs’ (ABT) Lingo Continuous Glucose System is the case to study. Lingo collects –legally, as far as we are aware – glucose and other human data to render tailored plans for nutrition, diet, and activity.
The aim is to Improve outcomes for eating, weight loss, and diabetes.
What makes the Lingo different from the dozens of other glucose, diabetes, and diet management apps is its backer is established pharma giant Abbott Labs. Abbott is run by Robert Ford, who at 49 years old has emerged as the Steve Jobs of the drug industry.
Ford committed to therapeutic applications for remotely collected health data back in 2020 with the FreeStyle Libre device. Abbott has found success in the pharma marketing trenches. It helped create Abbvie, the sixth largest pharma company globally. It is also the largest advertiser in North America, as of the end of 2024.
It’s too early to say if Lingo will move the value needle for a $196 billion pharma giant like Abbott. But with 1 in 8 people battling obesity, Lingo’s data-driven approach is worth a look.
