Business Model Innovation in Digital Health: Bob Allison, Co-Founder of PEAR Health Labs (Part 4)

Sramana Mitra: Which brands did you go after?

Bob Allison: We built for Intel. We also built stuff for Bose, Life Fitness, and New Balance. We were building app experiences around training for these brands. We did TRX. The whole list probably had 25 brands.

Sramana Mitra: Can you double-click down on the business model? What I like about this is, very often, we see business ideas that are going to be super expensive to go to market as a B2C company. With the business model that you have pursued successfully, if you follow that route, you can go-to-market by piggybacking on other people’s brands and marketing dollars. Talk to me about the business model.

Business Model Innovation in Digital Health: Bob Allison, Co-Founder of PEAR Health Labs (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: How did you do the Bluetooth piece?

Bob Allison: When Bluetooth came out, we started the piece that was Bluetooth. Originally, there wasn’t any Bluetooth; it was a direct connection only. You would take your dongle from your computer, plug it into our little radio, and you would import your music file.

Sramana Mitra: You were selling a device?

Bob Allison: Right.

Business Model Innovation in Digital Health: Bob Allison, Co-Founder of PEAR Health Labs (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: What happens next?

Bob Allison: If I’d sold it for $200 million then, I’d have a different storyline. One of the things I didn’t know very well at that time was how to value my business. We did an exchange. There was some cash. It was primarily stock. In 1990, there was a big collapse in the marketplace. That affected Mimic. After that, I went to work for Aero Electronics.

Business Model Innovation in Digital Health: Bob Allison, Co-Founder of PEAR Health Labs (Part 1)

Bob has a background in semiconductors where the key business model for selling chips is getting them into design wins. In PEAR, Bob has parlayed this model into a platform business catering to many top brands who bring Digital Health products to market on their platform.

There is a lot to learn for entrepreneurs from this case study about a unique and relevant go-to-market strategy, as software eats the world, and ALL companies have to now become tech companies.

Serial Entrepreneur Bootstrapping Three PropTech Ventures: LuxuryProperty Founder Jason Hayes (Part 6)

Sramana Mitra: What you’ve built is a vertical search engine that is specific to luxury real estate. That has its own meta tags and meta data. What is the AI part of it?

Jason Hayes: We do have some AI agents launching soon. We believe that we are going to be the first to do that. Certainly in the Middle East anyway. The AI we’re using is in the backend of the system. For our brokers who work for us, we have what we call the opportunity platform. That is an app that forms part of the CRM.

Serial Entrepreneur Bootstrapping Three PropTech Ventures: LuxuryProperty Founder Jason Hayes (Part 5)

Sramana Mitra: Let’s go to the Dubai business. Why Dubai?

Jason Hayes: Tax. We don’t pay tax over here. We enjoy the most incredible taxation over here. There is no income tax or capital gains tax. That was a big driver for me. I was hugely keen to go into the PropTech area. Dubai has the most enormous real estate market. It looked to be the most incredible place to do the property portal.

Serial Entrepreneur Bootstrapping Three PropTech Ventures: LuxuryProperty Founder Jason Hayes (Part 4)

Sramana Mitra: One of the keys to building scalable businesses is to operate within guardrails. What you’re pointing out in deciding not to go for any kind of permit is a huge decision. It’s a smart decision. That allows you to move quickly. In the business that you did first versus this business, it’s a different model. Debt financing is the same, but you’re not building as much in the balance sheet.

Jason Hayes: That’s right.

Serial Entrepreneur Bootstrapping Three PropTech Ventures: LuxuryProperty Founder Jason Hayes (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: What segment were you going after? What kind of price?

Jason Hayes: I started by buying homes around the $300,000 mark. I was looking to go for volume and was trying to spread the risk. Sometimes, we would buy homes that were significantly cheaper and sometimes, we would buy homes that were significantly greater in value. For me, it was all about what the value proposition was.