Step 1 of 4 · 2010–14

Price and quality search for every service

Treatment for one condition, or prices for every service

Hinge Health chose one expensive condition and delivered the care for it. Daniel Perez and Gabriel Mecklenburg had each spent a year in rehab after injuries, and in 2014 they sketched the tools they had wanted and founded the company CHLX-14. By 2017 it ran a 12-week remote program for chronic back and knee pain, with wearable sensors guiding exercises and health coaches supporting each participant, and Perez sold it to employers as an alternative to surgery and drugs, which he said made up most of their costs CHLX-10. An employer bought a course of treatment with a start, an end and a patient whose progress could be tracked.

Castlight worked at the moment before care, when an employee picked a provider. Giovanni Colella co-founded it with Todd Park and Bryan Roberts, and its tools combined insurance claims with each employee's benefit plan to estimate out-of-pocket costs by doctor and place, alongside quality measures CHLX-12. The first customer implementation came in 2010 CA1. Among privately insured Californians the median MRI cost $746, with a range of $458 to $3,409 CHLX-12. A study of 18 employers linked use of a price-transparency tool to lower payments for selected services CA6. The savings came from employees who searched, and giving a workforce access did not mean the workforce would search CA1 CA6.

Rivals Hinge Health sold a remote program for back and joint pain, combining wearable sensors, an app and health coaching, mainly to US employers and health plans, and had 200 implementations by early 2020 CHLX-9.

Tech-Enabled ServicesFocus Strategy

Step 4 of 4 · 2018–22

Revenue flat, then sold to a care provider

Hinge then made each member cheaper to serve. TrueMotion, its motion-tracking software, gives real-time feedback during exercise sessions, and the company estimated that its platform cut the care-team hours of traditional physical therapy by about 95% in 2024 CHLX-5. GAAP gross margin rose from 66% in 2023 to 77% in 2024 and 80% in 2025, while revenue grew from $292.7 million to $587.9 million CHLX-5 CHLX-6. Investors valued Hinge at $6.2 billion in October 2021, and it went public in May 2025 at $32 a share CHLX-8 CHLX-7. Castlight's own partner page calls it the choice of four out of five employers that offer a digital musculoskeletal program CHLX-4.

Castlight's revenue stopped growing: $156.4 million in 2018, $143.3 million in 2019 and $146.7 million in 2020 CA3. Its 2020 annual report named Accolade and Grand Rounds as its most common and significant competitors, and said health plans such as Aetna, Cigna, Anthem and UnitedHealth offered their own care guidance tools at discounted prices or often for free CA3. Accolade had gone public in July 2020 on $132.5 million of annual revenue and was valued at about $2.5 billion by March 2021, when Grand Rounds, last valued at $1.34 billion, agreed to merge with Doctor On Demand CHLX-15 CHLX-16. Castlight added high-touch human Care Guides and in October 2019 folded Anthem's services into one SaaS agreement CA3. In January 2022 it agreed to combine with Vera Whole Health, an advanced primary care company, for $2.05 a share in cash, about $370 million of equity value CA4. Chief executive Maeve O'Meara said the deal would enable "employers to participate in full risk sharing for the first time" CA4. Vera completed the acquisition on February 17, 2022, eight years after Castlight's IPO at $16 a share CA5 CA1. Joining Vera attached Castlight's navigation to a company paid to deliver care, the position Hinge had held from its start.

Rivals Hinge Health reported $587.9 million of 2025 revenue and 782,890 members at year-end CHLX-6. Grand Rounds, which helped employees find specialists and interpret insurance claims, was last valued at $1.34 billion in 2020 before its 2021 merger with Doctor On Demand CHLX-16.

Service-as-Software