Amazon buys healthcare startup to boost employee wellness

Amazon.com Inc. has acquired Health Navigator, a medical technology startup, in an effort to bolster its health-care offerings for employees.

The startup will be wrapped into a clinic for workers that launched last month at the company’s Seattle-based headquarters. The program also known as Amazon Care offers virtual and in-person consultations, and delivery of prescriptions to employees’ offices and homes.

Amazon Care is a step towards a nonprofit working on ways to halt the rise in employee health-care costs. 

Amazon confirmed the acquisition to CNBC, and said that Health Navigator will join the company’s Amazon Care group, which launched in September. Amazon Care is designed to serve as a medical benefit for employees and helps provide care virtually, through a video visit, and with home visits if additional care is needed.

“The service eliminates travel and wait time, connecting employees and their family members to a physician or nurse practitioner through live chat or video, with the option for in-person follow up services from a registered nurse ranging from immunizations to instant strep throat detection,” an Amazon spokesperson told CNBC in an email.

Separately, the company is working to build on nascent businesses that sell to health-care providers and consumers. Amazon last year bought PillPack, an online pharmacy. It also sells office and medical supplies through its Amazon Business program.

Amazon didn’t disclose financial terms of the deal yet.