Collective Health, Noom Health partner for weight management

Employee health benefits management platform Collective Health is partnering with digital healthcare platform and weight loss company Noom‘s enterprise division, Noom Health, to deliver Collective Health + Noom Med with SmartRx, an enterprise weight management platform with an integrated GLP-1 drug program that will be accessible to Collective Health employer customers.

The partnership will combine Noom’s digital health management platform with Collective Health’s benefits administration infrastructure and personalized care navigation. The aim is to deliver an uninterrupted tool and member experience for weight management as well as expand access to GLP-1 class drugs and other anti-obesity medications. 

Collective Health functions as a third-party health benefits administrator, bringing companies’ various benefits, including medical, dental, vision and pharmacy, into one platform, allowing employers to manage their offerings while assisting employees with navigating their healthcare.

The platform also provides employers with insights to control costs and enhance health outcomes. 

Noom Health links people to content, coaching, community and clinicians with the aim of providing access to critical medications and promoting persistent positive behaviors.

Key features of Collective Health + Noom Med with SmartRx include personalized member cost-sharing levels for GLP-1 medications that provide predictable and manageable expenses, appropriate GLP-1 prescriptions for qualified customers and pharmacy fulfillment that includes home delivery of brand-name medications. 

“We know that without a better cost management structure, most employers are unable to cover these life-changing medications for their population, despite their extraordinary efficacy in reducing obesity,” Cody Fair, chief commercial officer at Noom, said in a statement.

“We view partnerships like the one with Collective Health as mission critical to ensuring affordability and accessibility of anti-obesity medications.”

Manar Bustami, vice president of strategic partnerships at Collective Health, pointed out that the partnership with Noom Health is an example of the company’s commitment and ability to strategically partner with healthcare industry leaders.

“By combining Collective Health and Noom Health’s respective strengths, we are able to offer our employer customers and members an extremely powerful program to achieve sustainable weight loss and improved health outcomes, while helping our employer customers and members better manage the growing financial burden associated with GLP-1 medications for the treatment of obesity,” Bustami said in a statement.

THE LARGER TREND

In 2023, Collective Health laid off 54 employees and restructured its workforce to better align with customer needs. Company CEO Ali Diab said employees were being let go due to a “workforce reduction.” He urged companies that may encounter those employees during the hiring process to provide them with “strong consideration.”

In 2021, Collective Health launched its Premier Partnership Program aimed at bringing together digital health companies to help employers curate, integrate, measure impact and drive engagement with their virtual offerings.

The aim is to offer support in identifying the best fitting digital health platforms for each employee population, calculate return on investments, judge clinical outcomes and suggest recommendations based on user data.

In February, Noom Health laid off a portion of its staff. A company spokesperson told MobiHealthNew, “In an effort to build a more efficient business centered around the needs of our customers, we made the difficult decision to reduce a portion of our workforce.”

According to the spokesperson, the move was related to “a revenue mix shift within the Noom business towards our fast-growing GLP-1-related products, including Noom GLP-1Rx and Noom GLP-1 Companion.” 

In 2024, Noom Health partnered with dance fitness company Zumba to give Noom members access to Zumba fitness content and allow Zumba’s dance instructors to become “Mindset Coaches” at Noom.

Noom’s members can participate in Zumba’s “exhilarating dance routines” and “targeted fitness sessions,” along with motivational and engagement options to keep them focused on their goals.

In return, Zumba instructors are able to join Noom as Mindset Coaches for free for a limited period as well as receive instruction in Noom’s coaching methodologies, which range from psychology to technology.