NEW YORK – Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway and JPMorgan will disband Haven, a joint venture aimed at lowering healthcare costs for their United States employees, just three years after launching.
The announcement yesterday means the three major American companies admitted defeat in their attempt to address one of the most vexing and longstanding problems for employers and employees alike in the world’s largest economy.
Haven said on its website that the venture will end late next month, although the companies plan to “continue to collaborate informally to design programmes tailored to address the specific needs of their own employee populations”.
The company did not elaborate on the decision and did not respond to a request for comment, but JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon said the venture produced some success.
“We’re proud of the progress the Haven team made exploring a wide range of healthcare solutions, including pilots at our company, to make primary care easier to access and insurance benefits simpler to understand and easier to use,” he said in a note to employees.
Jeff Bezos’s Amazon, Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway and financial giant JPMorgan Chase announced in January 2018 the plan to create a non-profit healthcare plan to “provide US employees and their families with simplified, high-quality and transparent healthcare at a reasonable cost”.
The trio aimed to become a disruptor in the healthcare industry, just as Amazon has in retail, using their combined data, technology, buying power and customer contacts to improve delivery while cutting costs.
The companies did not specify how many people will benefit under the new programme, but a source said at the time, domestic employees of the companies and their dependents likely amount to at least a million workers nationwide. – AFP, January 5, 2021
