Amazon.com Inc., JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Berkshire Hathaway Inc. established three years ago to join and transform healthcare. Instead, they struggled to solve even fundamental challenges, such as understanding how much some types of care actually cost.
Haven, the joint venture they established together in 2018 to use technology and find new ways to reduce costs for their 1.5 million employees, will close operations next month. The project cost the three companies about $ 100 million combined, people familiar with the budget said.
Since its inception, Haven has faced challenges in obtaining data, staff turnover, fuzzy goals and unexpected competition, according to employees and former employees of Haven and partner companies. These factors condemned the partnership from the start, these people said.
The data was a central challenge. Haven struggled to aggregate and analyze information about the health care costs of employees at the three companies. Concerns about partner data and insurer resistance have frustrated Haven’s efforts to determine how much companies paid for medical care and why, people said.
Haven is not the first company to tackle the lack of transparency in healthcare costs and data, a problem that has long complicated government reform efforts and technology solutions. A new rule from the Trump administration, in force this year, should force greater disclosure of rates negotiated between hospitals and insurance companies.