National Australia Bank Acquires Digital Health Claims Platform LanternPay

National Australia Bank is acquiring digital health claims startup LanternPay, the latest salvo in an ongoing battle for supremacy in the $120 billion health payments sector, according to an American Financial Review report Thursday (Jan. 13).

LanternPay’s technology will help to reduce administration work for doctors and medical practices by providing claims for a larger number of insurance plans, including Medicare, workers compensation and the National Disability Insurance Scheme, which processes $20 billion in payments a year.

NAB will also use LanternPay to create a Health Industry Claims and Payment Service app that will allow claims to be made through mobile phones for practices that do not have physical terminals. Bank officials say they want to attract and retain customers who work in healthcare for loans and deposits.

NAB’s head of business banking Andrew Irvine said the bank had been a “passive shareholder” in Medipass, which had never been integrated into HICAPS, and it was important to have full ownership to make sure new technology could be merged with existing offerings.

“Customers who previously might have waited days for a reimbursement from the NDIS, for example, will now receive this payment on the spot,” he said. “If we are taking out administration for a doctor, so they have less paperwork and are making it easy for their patients to get a claim, all these things create value in an ecosystem.”

Related: Johnson & Johnson-Microsoft Pact Shows Transformative Potential of Connected Healthcare

On Tuesday (Jan. 11), Johnson & Johnson Medical Devices Companies (JJMDC) and Microsoft announced a partnership, integrating Microsoft’s cloud computing capabilities across JJMDC’s medical ecosystem.

Johnson & Johnson will “collaborate with Microsoft to further enable and expand JJMDC’s secure and compliant digital surgery ecosystem. The Microsoft Cloud will help JJMDC realize its vision of driving innovation that advances skills, improves workflow, and enhances surgical decision making for a better overall customer experience and improved patient and economic outcomes.”

The collaboration will include artificial intelligence, machine learning, robotics, imaging, data and analytics.