Bengaluru-based Clinikk helps gig-economy workers get health coverage

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Mohan (name changed), 34, drives a mini truck in Bengaluru, transporting goods like furniture, groceries and other things. He takes orders from online aggregators like Porter.

A migrant from Madanapalle, Andhra Pradesh, Mohan bought the second-hand mini truck borrowing money from a private financer. He lives in a rented house with his wife and two school-going children.

He works 10-12 hours, earns between Rs 20,000-Rs 25000 a month. But he isn’t covered by any health insurance. Any illness in his family is going to cost Mohan his livelihood and worse may push him into poverty.

Mohan is a typical gig economy worker, a migrant and without a formal employment to become eligible for social security benefits like Employees' State Insurance (ESI). An ESI is a self-financing social security and health insurance scheme covering workers who own less than Rs 21,000.

It is estimated that one-fourth of Indians have been left outside the healthcare insurance umbrella.  This isn’t a small number.

Clinikk, the Bengaluru based healthcare startup, is targeting this segment.

Clinikk typically ties up with gig economy companies like OLA, Uber, Porter, Swiggy, among others to provide health coverage to their partners.

It works on a subscription model where subscribers pay a monthly fee starting from Rs 50 going up to Rs 500, that cover their primary healthcare needs and medical insurance, for up to six members in a family.

Clinikk has a team of doctors and health assistants, who provide tele-consultations in 11 languages on 24x7 basis. In case of hospitalisation, the subscriber is directed to the nearest network hospital.

Clinikk has tied up with major health insurers such as Aditya Birla, Magma and  Religare among others to provide cashless hospitalisation benefits in more than 5,500 empanelled hospitals across the country covering more than 16,000 pincodes.

Clinikk has built a platform that provides e-health profile, insurance claim support, and discounted medicine delivery and lab testing.

"Our plan is to increase active users to 1 million in next one year,"  Bhavjot Kaur, Co-founder of Clinikk told Moneycontrol.

Clinikk was founded by Kaur and orthopedic surgeon Suraj Baliga in 2016. Kaur herself a geologist working with MNC oil company, left her job to venture in healthcare in 2016.

Clinikk currently has 3 lakh active subscribers.

Since its founding, the healthcare startup had raised over $1 million in seed funding, and plans to raise more in coming months.

The funding will be used to build a robust artificial intelligence (AI) engine to collect data more efficiently, standardise medical protocols and improve efficiency of doctors, Kaur said

Clinikk, which makes its money from the subscription fee, has already broken even at a unit level, she added.