The Rise of Voice RPA in Healthcare: Infinitus Secures $21.4 Million

Robotic process automation (RPA) is increasingly prevalent in enterprise IT, leveraging AI and technology to automate repetitive tasks. This allows personnel to concentrate on more complex work. Now, a startup named Infinitus is extending this concept to the healthcare sector, aiming to streamline voice communication within the often-fragmented U.S. healthcare system.

Infinitus's Voice RPA Technology

Infinitus employs “voice RPA” to function as a machine-generated voice for calls originating from healthcare providers or pharmacies. These calls are directed to insurance companies to complete a series of questions, typically requiring human responses before authorizations and procedures can proceed.

The resulting conversations are then processed by Infinitus’s platform. Relevant information is extracted and inputted into the appropriate fields, triggering necessary actions based on the call’s outcome.

Early Adoption and Pandemic Support

Although emerging from “stealth mode” recently, Infinitus has been operational for several years. The company has already secured contracts with major healthcare organizations, including wholesale drug distributor AmerisourceBergen.

Furthermore, Infinitus is offering its technology pro bono to support public health initiatives related to the coronavirus pandemic. One organization is currently utilizing it to automate a mass calling system across multiple states, assessing vaccine availability and connecting early doses with vulnerable populations.

In January alone, the system facilitated 75,000 calls on behalf of 12,000 providers.

Series A Funding and Investor Confidence

Infinitus’s public launch coincides with a significant funding achievement: a $21.4 million Series A round. This investment will fuel the company’s growth and development.

The funding round is jointly led by Kleiner Perkins and Coatue, with participation from Gradient Ventures (Google’s AI fund), Quiet Capital, Firebolt Ventures, and Tau Ventures. Individual investments also came from AI and tech industry leaders like Ian Goodfellow, Gokul Rajaram, Aparna Chennapragada, and Qasar Younis.

Coatue's Investment in RPA

Coatue is demonstrating a strong commitment to the RPA opportunity. They recently co-led a new investment in UiPath, a leading RPA provider, and have participated in previous funding rounds as well.

“Coatue is proud to have led the Series A in Infinitus,” states Yanda Erlich, a general partner at Coatue. “We strongly believe in the transformative potential of RPA and Enterprise Automation. Infinitus’ VoiceRPA solution allows healthcare organizations to automate previously expensive and manual calls and faxes, resulting in end-to-end process automation benefits.”

Addressing Healthcare's Communication Challenges

Infinitus tackles a significant issue within the U.S. healthcare system: the time-consuming and often complex administrative processes. A substantial portion of these inefficiencies stem from voice communications, which are central to interactions between various healthcare entities.

Voice calls are frequently used to initiate processes, obtain information, follow up on communications, transmit data, and authorize payments.

The Scale of Voice Communication in Healthcare

An estimated 900 million of these calls occur annually in the U.S., averaging 35 minutes in length. Healthcare professionals in administrative roles dedicate approximately 4.5 hours each day to phone calls.

This extensive reliance on voice communication contributes to the high costs of healthcare services and can cause delays in patient care.

The Genesis of Infinitus

Co-founder and CEO Ankit Jain, a serial entrepreneur and former Google executive, conceived the idea for Infinitus while at Gradient. He observed advancements in voice technology, specifically text-to-speech and speech-to-text capabilities.

Jain realized that automating full conversations with machines was becoming feasible.

Google’s Duplex service, launched around the same time, demonstrated similar principles, focusing on consumer applications like appointment booking.

Beyond Simple Conversation

Jain recognized that enterprise applications, such as those in healthcare, require more than just human-like conversation. They depend on specialized terminology and specific scenarios that differ from typical human interactions.

“I thought, if someone wanted to build this for healthcare it would change it,” he explained, leading to the founding of Infinitus.

Technology and Future Expansion

Infinitus utilizes public cloud speech-to-text systems, but its natural language processing and conversation management are developed in-house. This specialization may provide a competitive advantage, at least initially.

However, Jain acknowledges that much of the technology is adaptable to other industries, suggesting potential for expansion beyond healthcare. He also recognizes that others could potentially develop competing solutions.

A Deliberate Approach to Voice Design

Recognizing concerns about deception with lifelike voices, Infinitus intentionally uses voices that sound robotic. This transparency aims to clearly indicate to callers that they are interacting with a machine.

Jain believes this approach also “helps reduce the level of chatter” and keeps the conversation focused on the task at hand.

Currently, the system achieves high success rates without requiring human intervention for call triage.

The Persistence of Voice in Healthcare

Despite advancements in data exchange technologies, voice communication remains prevalent in healthcare. Fragmentation within the market hinders the implementation of standardized data exchange protocols.

For many administrators dealing with numerous entities, each with different systems, a phone call remains the most practical solution.

Infinitus: A Step Towards Modernization

Infinitus’s voiceRPA solution represents a step towards modernizing the healthcare system. By automating one aspect of the process, it demonstrates the potential for broader change.

“By automating one side we are showing the other side that it can be done,” Jain said. “Right now, there are just too many players and getting them to agree on one standard is a gargantuan task, so trying to win one small piece after another is how it’s done. It should not be voice, but by the time standards bodies agree on something else, the world has moved on.”