To continue market leadership and achieve global expansion goals to meet the needs of a workplace wellness industry that grew to $43.3 billion in 2015*, The Vitality Group in the US and Discovery Partner Markets in Europe and the Asia Pacific region have merged. Operating as Vitality Group International, the organization will continue its mission to make people healthier and enhance and protect their lives as a multi-national corporation domiciled in the US, with main offices in the US and South Africa. Leading this effort is Barry Swartzberg who was named Vitality Group CEO.
This merger between two major business units that are part of Discovery Ltd., a global financial service organization and pioneer of the Shared-value Insurance model, will serve more than 4 million members in 14 countries around the world and bring scale to launch Vitality to another ten markets over the next two years. The move will speed up the development and dissemination of intellectual property for use globally and brings together the InsureTech business and the corporate Vitality program that draws on behavioral economics, and supports, guides and incentivizes individuals to improve their health.
“We’ve consolidated our efforts into a larger more resilient business with a unified strategy, executive team and consistent approach,” said Tal Gilbert, newly named Vitality USA CEO. “This will enable us to continue to drive international adoption of our Shared-Value Insurance model that offers members incentives for doing things that make them healthier and develop partnerships with leading insurers to bring Vitality to employers and consumers globally.”
Over the last few years, Vitality has successfully partnered with AIA, Generali, John Hancock, Manulife, Ping An and Sumitomo Life to bring the Vitality Shared-Value Insurance model to these markets. These leading insurers are among the 500 biggest companies in the world and cover markets which collectively make up ±75% of the world’s life insurance premiums. Tremendous gains have also been made in growing Vitality’s corporate business with hundreds of US employers including KOOP Award winner McKesson and KOOP Award honorable mention recipient Lockton.
Vitality has also rolled out Active Rewards with Apple Watch to five countries with another five planned for 2017, resulting in Discovery being the largest seller of Apple Watches in South Africa.
*https://www.globalwellnessinstitute.org/press-room/statistics-and-facts/
