Reston IT consulting firm 1Rivet thinks it can help business leaders give their employees a sense of security in the age of coronavirus — and control a potential outbreak — as they look to return to the office.
The 12-year-old company, which often builds apps for its clients, has developed a platform to help other businesses transition back to work. MyHealthyWork is a web and mobile application that tracks employees’ self-reported health information, whereabouts and interactions. The product, now a week into its beta phase, is slated to launch by mid-June.
“People have got to be thoughtful about their health and make sure that they’re not going to bring their symptoms to work or we’re going to affect other people, because those people all have families, too,” said Eric Middleton, CEO and managing partner of 1Rivet.
How does it work, exactly? Employees answer basic questions each morning (think: temperature, symptoms, feelings) and the system generates a recommended work location for that day based on Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines, with color-coded results: green result means workers can go to the office, yellow means to exercise caution, orange means stay home and red means one has tested positive for Covid-19.
It’s gamified with a points system “to make this fun for organizations,” Middleton said. But it doesn’t use GPS or Bluetooth, he said, because “we wanted employees to feel like they have control of their own data.”
The tech has a contact tracing component, in which users check in as they move around — the conference room or kitchen, for instance — and report meetings and interactions in the app. It also uses QR codes, connecting people who have spent time in the same areas. If an individual tests positive for Covid-19, others that person has interacted with — directly and by extension — receive notifications from the app to stay home. Human resources would approve returns to the office thereafter. “We didn’t want the app to make that decision," Middleton said.
MyHealthyWork will follow a subscription model, priced at $8.75 per month per employee — 29 cents a day — or about $105 for the year per person. Companies ranging in size can sign up on a month-to-month basis, though it’s probably not as effective for very small teams with only a handful of people, Middleton said.
1Rivet has self-funded the project through its technology consulting business. It plans to hire for its sales and support team as it brings new clients onboard, Middleton said. The company is aiming for MyHealthyWork to account for 10% of 1Rivet’s overall revenue this year, which is projected to be between $13 million and $15 million — up from $11 million in 2019, he said.
The app has competition, from players such as Salesforce and Microsoft and UnitedHealth, as well as other types of contact tracing apps for businesses, such as that of Rockville’s Acquired Data Solutions Inc. Then there are public-facing products, which Apple and Google are working on. But Middleton sees opportunity, he said, with the potential to expand into a crisis management tool beyond the pandemic by enabling employers to reach staff in any type of situation, he said. That could also mean incorporating telemedicine and other mental health tools down the line.
“Today, a company does not really have all those apps in one place,” Middleton said.
It’s the second app 1Rivet has developed and designed for itself rather than one of its 30 clients; the first is an e-commerce platform that connects parents to coaches and tutors for their children, also not yet live. 1Rivet, one of the Washington Business Journal’s 2018 Fastest Growing Companies, employs nearly 200 people in two India offices, and another 50 people at its Reston headquarters.
Editor’s Note: This story first appeared in the Washington Business Journal. See the original post here.
