ⓒ WELT

Now it’s time to take a look at a Korean business bringing about changes in the global economy with some new ideas. 

Today, we’re going to introduce you to a digital healthcare startup named WELT. Let’s hear from company CEO Kang Seong-ji. 

WELT Corporation was established in 2016 as a spinoff of C-LAB, which is Samsung Electronics’ in-house venture program. It is a digital healthcare company that incorporates information technology into healthcare and develops both hardware, including wearable products and software like digital therapeutics. Medical doctors treat sick people, and the Ministry of Health and Welfare is in charge of public health management. And it is technicians and businesspeople who explore the possibility of actually realizing the mission through technology. I’ve focused on this part since I worked at Samsung Electronics. 

Kang was a talented student who won the presidential award at an invention fair while attending the Korean Minjok Leadership Academy. Afterwards, he worked as a doctor and a Samsung Electronics employee before setting up his own healthcare startup. 

At Samsung Electronics, he applied for the company’s internal venture project known as creative laboratory or C-LAB. Each year, the tech giant’s startup incubator program receives more than 1,000 new ideas related to various areas, including artificial intelligence and autonomous driving. Kang came through a competition of 1,000 to 1 with his creative idea about a smart belt that manages the wearer’s health. The healthcare smart belt called WELT, or Wellness Belt, has the same name as the company. 

The intelligent belt, the first of its kind in the world, helps wearers better understand their living habits and health conditions, and therefore manage their health in daily life. 

The smart belt looks just like an ordinary waist belt. Sensors embedded in the buckle measure your waist size, count the steps you’ve taken, calculate your sitting time during the day, monitor overeating and figure out gait patterns. The belt is also a measurement tool, with which patients of Parkinson’s disease, dementia or diabetes can guess how far their disease has progressed. 

The belt can be used for two to three months on a single battery charge, much longer than other wearable products like smartwatches that typically last for a week at the most. Compared to smart watches, the smart belt can measure various forms of data more accurately to show more detailed information about the user. 

WELT continues to make efforts to improve the quality of the smart belt, both as a smart device and a belt. It added the world’s first fall prevention function. Previous wearable items produced by other companies detect a fall only after it happens. WELT, on the other hand, can predict the risk of a fall in advance by analyzing any abnormal signs in gait patterns. With this product, the company won the Innovation Awards at CES 2020, the world’s largest consumer electronics fair. 

In addition to the smart belt, the company is focusing on the development of digital therapeutics, which will draw greater attention in the post-COVID-19 era. 

We’re developing software dealing with about six different diseases. Through clinical trials, the app examines whether patients who use the app and those who don’t show any difference in terms of remission. 

If you are a patient with diabetes, for example, you get the app or digital therapeutics, along with medicine. The app shows whether you take the medicine without fail and do exercise regularly. There are apps that serve as a pedometer, but they may recommend excessive exercise, not knowing that you have diabetes. But our product calculates a proper amount of exercise for you and tracks the steps taken. If you also use our smart belt, you can discover the changes in your waist circumference so you may manage your blood sugar level more effectively. 

Based on data, digital therapeutics can provide health guidance tailored to each individual, optimize the treatment process and contribute to producing better treatment results. Compared to conventional treatment that relied mostly on medicines, it is possible to collect and use extensive health information when treating diseases these days. 

Digital therapeutics refers to software programs designed to treat diseases and improve health, just like medicine. It comes in various forms, including mobile applications, games, virtual reality and artificial intelligence. Using digital therapeutics, patients can cure their disease without taking or applying medicine. The growth potential of this amazing medical software is unlimited. According to a report, the global digital therapeutics market is forecast to reach 8.67 billion US dollars by 2025 from 2 billion dollars in 2017 at an annual growth rate of 30 percent. 

As the first Asian member of the Digital Therapeutics Alliance, WELT is currently working on digital therapeutics for alcoholism, insomnia and a disease called Sarcopenia, a decrease in muscle in the aging population. The company is preparing to apply for the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety’s clinical test plans for its treatment solutions for alcoholism and insomnia. 

Unlike conventional medicines, digital therapeutics continues to change even after development. It is living treatment, which keeps evolving. I’d say it’s similar to AI. It’s our mission to quantify and analyze the treatment process and results in order to provide more effective treatment solutions. Most importantly, we need to use numerous data sets for the purpose of disease treatment and develop solutions aimed at providing customized treatment for each patient. 

WELT has recently secured an equity investment worth 2.7 million US dollars from local drug maker Handok Pharmaceuticals. IT powerhouse South Korea is expected to secure top-class competitiveness in the global digital therapeutics market. Amid the positive expectations, WELT is cited as one of the leading digital therapeutics companies in Korea. 

Digital therapeutics will certainly be a new trend. I hope the services created by my company will have a major impact on the market, although the company may look small. I also hope South Korea will exercise great power in the digital transformation of the pharmaceutical industry. WELT hopes to pave the way for the development of solutions directly related to human life and health. That’s why the company exists and what it is aiming for. 

The pandemic has accelerated changes in the medical industry. WELT is opening up a new path in the medical field through well-prepared innovation, that is, the combination of healthcare and new technology. We’re pinning high hopes on the future of the company.