Appointment booking firm HealthEngine raises $20m from investors
Australian start-up HealthEngine has raised AUD26.7m ($20.2m) in a series C funding round that was extended from the initial $20m sum, after interest from leading investor Sequoia India. HealthEngine, whose website and app allow patients to book appointments with a range of practitioners, has around 1 million users, while around a third of all GP practices are signed up, alongside dentists and physiotherapists. The firm will use the new funding to increase advertising and marketing, and also expand overseas through acquisitions.

HealthEngine has now raised close to $50 million to date. The company would not reveal its valuation, but it is likely to be well north of $100 million.

Sequoia has backed companies such as Apple, Google and LinkedIn and more recently Stripe, Airbnb and Whatsapp.

Sequoia India principal Pieter Kemps said he was impressed with the development of the business in Australia.

"They have built the foundation of a powerful Health Experience Platform that improves the lives of patients as well as healthcare practitioners," he said.

"We have been impressed by the HealthEngine team as they are credible domain experts with the technical and commercial smarts to build a world-class business."

The business was founded in 2006 by Dr Tan and Adam Yap and has shifted from being a digital healthcare directory to a booking service and eventually a marketplace.

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HealthEngine has 1 million Australians using the website or app every month and about a third of all GP practices in the country signed up, as well as dentists and physiotherapists.

Since changing from a directory to a booking service, the company has focused on building up the number of healthcare practices on the platform, but with the latest capital injection it will increase advertising and marketing, rather than having users discover the platform "serendipitously".

Dr Tan said he was also looking to expand HealthEngine overseas, with this likely to be done through acquisitions.

"The market size in australia is around $160 billion in healthcare per annum alone and globally expenditure is going up because of an ageing population, so it's still an exciting local opportunity," he said.

"But companies like Carsales have gone global after building a strong local business and acquiring companies overseas, and those options are available to us at the moment."

The healthcare sector is increasingly being disrupted, with a wide range of start-ups emerging in the field developing technologies such as 3D printed ears, apps to remind people to take their medication and wearable tech for the treatment of Parkinson's disease.

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Global Kinetics raised $14.8 million to expand to the US in 2015, medical software company HealthKit raised $1.6 million last year and the government has launched a $500 million Biomedical Translation Fund.

But Dr Tan said the sector was still at the start of its digital transformation.

"Healthcare is a long-fuse, big-bang type market. It takes a long time to get anything happening because it's such a conservative industry," he said.

"The fact a marketplace like ours is still solving these issues tells you the sector is a bit behind, but that doesn't make the tech less interesting."