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Here come the mobile labs. From the Wall Street Journal. Big time.
By Anne Kadet
March 16, 2021 10:00 am ET
I was surprised recently to spot a new business in my Brooklyn neighborhood. “COVID-19 RAPID TESTING” the sign trumpeted. “SAME DAY RESULTS.” It was a storefront dedicated entirely to coronavirus tests. This was puzzling. Why now? Aren’t we all getting vaccinated?
But this was no anomaly. For better or worse, entrepreneurs say Covid-19 testing will be a profitable business in New York City for a long time to come. Their ventures are ambitious and, in some cases, surprisingly imaginative.
Manhattan-based Todos Medical mainly develops cancer-detection tests. But next month it will launch what it believes to be the city’s first mobile Covid-testing labs. CEO Gerald Commissiong envisions the company’s 20-foot container boxes parked outside Madison Square Garden serving fans who need a fast lab result to attend a Knicks game.
The company has so far spent $1.2 million constructing two portable lab facilities and has 10 more in production. If demand meets expectations, the investment could pay off fast. Mr. Commissiong says the units can process 3,000 to 5,000 tests a day, charging $200 a pop. “We think there is going to be big demand in Manhattan with Broadway opening up,” he says.
Bracha Banayan, CEO of Brooklyn-based IVDrips, a service providing at-home IV hydration and nutrient treatments to combat maladies such as migraines and hangovers, says Covid testing accounts for 40% to 50% of her business, which expanded last year from 15 to 25 nurses.
It specializes in rush jobs. Nurses collect swabs from clients in their homes and offices, and speed them to a lab for testing. IVDrips has negotiated “VIP contracts” with four labs around New York City to get priority processing.
Customers pay $200 to $500 to get results in as little as eight hours, and wealthy clients planning last-minute travel are happy to pay. “They don’t blink an eye at those numbers,” Ms. Banayan says.
The dedicated Covid-testing storefront strategy also is attracting the venturesome. Maverick Health CEO and co-founder Ezra Gontownik, a healthcare entrepreneur, opened three such operations in downtown Manhattan last month and plans eight more uptown. He has partnered with a Financial District hotel to set up shop off the lobby, offering rapid-result tests to people attending weddings and other functions.
Like many of these startups, Maverick Health doesn’t take insurance for the tests, which start at $99, but they provide a wait-free experience and fast turnaround, Mr. Gontownik says.
The New York City market is appealing because it was hit hard by Covid-19 and it has a dense population, entrepreneurs say. People won’t travel far for a test and the business depends largely on high-visibility locations that advertise to passersby, say Maxo Oehme and Felix Huettenbach, co-founders of Sameday Health, a national Covid-testing business that launched in September and opened three locations in Manhattan and Brooklyn this year.
But how many providers do we need? The New York metro area offers one Covid-19 testing site for every 15,000 people—a rate double that of San Francisco and Boston, according to Castlight Health, a healthcare navigation company that provides directories and other services to employers.
The number of sites in the five boroughs, meanwhile, rose from 452 in September to 616 at the end of February, according to Castlight. While the count has decreased since peaking in December, that’s largely due to the mobile-testing facilities that were activated for the holidays being taken off the streets.
A medical worker stood outside a mobile Covid-19 testing lab in Brooklyn in January.
PHOTO: SPENCER PLATT/GETTY IMAGES
Dr. Talya Schwartz, president and CEO of MetroPlusHealth, the health insurance plan of NYC Health + Hospitals, says that while there was a testing-capacity shortage in the past, that hasn’t been the case for several months. “There is now sufficient capacity in the city to meet demand,” she says.
Nationwide, testing demand has dropped 46% since the start of the year, according to healthcare appointment booking platform Solv.
So why do new sites keep popping up? In some cases, the operations serve as a sort of Trojan horse—a location can offer Covid-19 testing now and additional services later.
It’s difficult to gain a foothold in New York City, but the pandemic created an opportunity for those bold enough to act fast. “We could never build a company this quick in normal times,” says Pavel Stuchlik, a Houston entrepreneur who is opening a three-story Covid-testing center on West 34th Street in Manhattan.
By the time test demand dwindles, he expects the startup he co-founded, Wellness 4 Humanity, to be well-established in New York City, serving corporate clients and individuals with a range of preventive and wellness-care services.
Others expect demand to last for a long while as the still unvaccinated see the city opening up and want to join the party.
Until the pandemic hit, Brooklyn-based Paradocs was best known for providing first aid and EMT services at some of the city’s biggest music festivals. Since then, it’s been administering up to 10,000 Covid-19 tests a week at construction sites and TV shoots. “Ninety-five percent of our business has been Covid testing,” says founder and CEO Alex Pollak. “We’ve done way more than we’ve ever done, revenue-wise.”
Now he’s getting requests to provide testing at concerts and music festivals that will require either proof of vaccination or a negative test result. “The big events are coming back in September,” he says.
But Mr. Pollak would rather not see the testing business booming. “If you told me tomorrow we don’t have to do any more Covid testing,” he says, “I’d be the happiest person ever.”
https://www.wsj.com/articles/entrepreneurs-ar...1615903201
By Anne Kadet
March 16, 2021 10:00 am ET
I was surprised recently to spot a new business in my Brooklyn neighborhood. “COVID-19 RAPID TESTING” the sign trumpeted. “SAME DAY RESULTS.” It was a storefront dedicated entirely to coronavirus tests. This was puzzling. Why now? Aren’t we all getting vaccinated?
But this was no anomaly. For better or worse, entrepreneurs say Covid-19 testing will be a profitable business in New York City for a long time to come. Their ventures are ambitious and, in some cases, surprisingly imaginative.
Manhattan-based Todos Medical mainly develops cancer-detection tests. But next month it will launch what it believes to be the city’s first mobile Covid-testing labs. CEO Gerald Commissiong envisions the company’s 20-foot container boxes parked outside Madison Square Garden serving fans who need a fast lab result to attend a Knicks game.
The company has so far spent $1.2 million constructing two portable lab facilities and has 10 more in production. If demand meets expectations, the investment could pay off fast. Mr. Commissiong says the units can process 3,000 to 5,000 tests a day, charging $200 a pop. “We think there is going to be big demand in Manhattan with Broadway opening up,” he says.
Bracha Banayan, CEO of Brooklyn-based IVDrips, a service providing at-home IV hydration and nutrient treatments to combat maladies such as migraines and hangovers, says Covid testing accounts for 40% to 50% of her business, which expanded last year from 15 to 25 nurses.
It specializes in rush jobs. Nurses collect swabs from clients in their homes and offices, and speed them to a lab for testing. IVDrips has negotiated “VIP contracts” with four labs around New York City to get priority processing.
Customers pay $200 to $500 to get results in as little as eight hours, and wealthy clients planning last-minute travel are happy to pay. “They don’t blink an eye at those numbers,” Ms. Banayan says.
The dedicated Covid-testing storefront strategy also is attracting the venturesome. Maverick Health CEO and co-founder Ezra Gontownik, a healthcare entrepreneur, opened three such operations in downtown Manhattan last month and plans eight more uptown. He has partnered with a Financial District hotel to set up shop off the lobby, offering rapid-result tests to people attending weddings and other functions.
Like many of these startups, Maverick Health doesn’t take insurance for the tests, which start at $99, but they provide a wait-free experience and fast turnaround, Mr. Gontownik says.
The New York City market is appealing because it was hit hard by Covid-19 and it has a dense population, entrepreneurs say. People won’t travel far for a test and the business depends largely on high-visibility locations that advertise to passersby, say Maxo Oehme and Felix Huettenbach, co-founders of Sameday Health, a national Covid-testing business that launched in September and opened three locations in Manhattan and Brooklyn this year.
But how many providers do we need? The New York metro area offers one Covid-19 testing site for every 15,000 people—a rate double that of San Francisco and Boston, according to Castlight Health, a healthcare navigation company that provides directories and other services to employers.
The number of sites in the five boroughs, meanwhile, rose from 452 in September to 616 at the end of February, according to Castlight. While the count has decreased since peaking in December, that’s largely due to the mobile-testing facilities that were activated for the holidays being taken off the streets.
A medical worker stood outside a mobile Covid-19 testing lab in Brooklyn in January.
PHOTO: SPENCER PLATT/GETTY IMAGES
Dr. Talya Schwartz, president and CEO of MetroPlusHealth, the health insurance plan of NYC Health + Hospitals, says that while there was a testing-capacity shortage in the past, that hasn’t been the case for several months. “There is now sufficient capacity in the city to meet demand,” she says.
Nationwide, testing demand has dropped 46% since the start of the year, according to healthcare appointment booking platform Solv.
So why do new sites keep popping up? In some cases, the operations serve as a sort of Trojan horse—a location can offer Covid-19 testing now and additional services later.
It’s difficult to gain a foothold in New York City, but the pandemic created an opportunity for those bold enough to act fast. “We could never build a company this quick in normal times,” says Pavel Stuchlik, a Houston entrepreneur who is opening a three-story Covid-testing center on West 34th Street in Manhattan.
By the time test demand dwindles, he expects the startup he co-founded, Wellness 4 Humanity, to be well-established in New York City, serving corporate clients and individuals with a range of preventive and wellness-care services.
Others expect demand to last for a long while as the still unvaccinated see the city opening up and want to join the party.
Until the pandemic hit, Brooklyn-based Paradocs was best known for providing first aid and EMT services at some of the city’s biggest music festivals. Since then, it’s been administering up to 10,000 Covid-19 tests a week at construction sites and TV shoots. “Ninety-five percent of our business has been Covid testing,” says founder and CEO Alex Pollak. “We’ve done way more than we’ve ever done, revenue-wise.”
Now he’s getting requests to provide testing at concerts and music festivals that will require either proof of vaccination or a negative test result. “The big events are coming back in September,” he says.
But Mr. Pollak would rather not see the testing business booming. “If you told me tomorrow we don’t have to do any more Covid testing,” he says, “I’d be the happiest person ever.”
https://www.wsj.com/articles/entrepreneurs-ar...1615903201
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