Rehovots' Hi-Tech: Card Guard, Humana in Telemedicine Joint Venture

"Card Guard AG (SWX: CARDG) and Humana Innovation Enterprises, a subsidiary of Humana Inc. (HUM), announced today that they have formed Sensei Inc., a new company designed to offer personalized monitoring services for wellness and disease management. Sensei, which is 50% owned by Card Guard AG and 50% by Humana, will be operated mainly as a wireless information platform, on which subscribers will be able to receive personalized nutrition, weight loss information, fitness notifications and medication reminders through their mobile phones and/or PDA's. The company's first services are scheduled to be available to subscribers in the first half of 2006.

Card Guard chairman and CEO Yacov Geva said, "Card Guard will provide technical know-how and experience to Sensei in order to construct a multimedia platform that answers the health, wellness and disease management demands of 21st-century consumers around the world."

The Sensei platform will be marketed through wireless carriers, weight loss companies, fitness centers, consumer electronic companies and web portals. By 2007, the platform is also expected to include monitoring for hypertension, diabetes, heart failure, stress reduction, and asthma, among other conditions.

Sensei CEO Terry Minton said, "Sensei is well positioned to capitalize on the vision and resources of Humana and Card Guard to positively impact consumer behavior."

Israel's Card Guard became a Switzerland based company in 2001. Card Guard is now headquartered in Neuhausen am Rheinfall, Switzerland, with subsidiaries in the US, the Netherlands, Japan, Brazil, the UK, Switzerland and Israel. Card Guard Scientific Survival, the fully owned Israeli subsidiary of the company, is located at the Rabin Science Park in Rehovot."

Source: Card Guard, Humana in telemedicine joint venture. Globes.com (19 October 2005) [FullText]