It was only a matter of time before tech giants got interested in health because the industry is massive and ripe for disruption.
At Business Insider's IGNITION 2018 conference, New York University marketing professor Scott Galloway laid out which of the four tech giants — Facebook, Google, Apple, or Amazon — will do the best in healthcare.
At the top of his list is Amazon, which he said will soon be the "fastest-growing healthcare company in the world."
Galloway has been known for his predictions when it comes to Amazon, first predicting it would acquire Whole Foods and more recently correctly calling which cities Amazon would pick as its headquarters, which gives his analysis here some clout.
For Facebook, the answer was clear.
"No one's going to tell Facebook about their diabetes or STDs," Galloway said.
Google, for its part, is looking at more moonshots, Galloway said. Alphabet, Google's parent company, has a number of bets in healthcare, ranging from Verily, its life-sciences arm that's developing everything from glucose-monitoring contact lenses to surgical robots, to Calico, its life-extension spinoff.
Galloway said he'd expect most people to choose Apple, but he said he'd place it as second.
"I think we over-inflate the value of wearables," Galloway said, adding that the only true wearable is your phone.
But it's Amazon that has a good shot at taking on healthcare, in Galloway's opinion. Unlike Apple, Amazon investors are more comfortable with investments that are capital intensive in the short term, like healthcare.
"Amazon knows how healthy you are," Galloway said.
The company has data on your eating habits, as well as on your relationship status and whether you have kids, all of which can be used to determine your health.
Galloway said Amazon's also good at determining which businesses to get into and which to outsource.
"This is the perfect fulcrum for an entry into healthcare, to decide which businesses you want to be in, which you don't, and they'll have the best dataset on not only two-thirds of households which now have Prime, but also on the healthiest households," Galloway said.
Amazon for its part acquired online pharmacy PillPack this year and is working with JPMorgan and Berkshire Hathaway on a joint healthcare venture aimed at lowering healthcare costs for the companies' employees.
See who's speaking now — check out the livestream of Business Insider's IGNITION 2018:
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