Business development challenges in medication management project

Introduction: Different degrees of vision impairments are inevitable results of growing old. Novel ICT services have potential to provide an easy, simple and intuitive way to access information and digital services. However, market entry of such services is challenging. Objective: The objective of this paper is to explore the difficulties and challenges in business development of medication management services for visually impaired older users. Methodology: The paper summarizes findings from an AAL JP project where new solutions for medication management were developed. Findings are based on field studies and related business development work done by project partners. Results: The business development challenges were faced in the following areas. Firstly, technology used (NFC and smart phones for older adults) did not penetrate the markets according to the estimates done in the beginning for the project. Secondly, the integration with existing infrastrucures (such as pharmacy systems, electronic prescription etc.) proved to require long-term effort difficult to achieve in a R&D project. Thirdly, the solutions developed did not match the business strategy of project partners, so market entry would require new actors.