Carbon Health announces another round of layoffs, plans to shutter RPM, chronic care programs

About six months after cutting 8% of its global workforce, hybrid primary care company Carbon Health announced on Friday another round of layoffs and corporate restructuring efforts.

The company reduced its global workforce by more than 200 people, Carbon Health CEO Eren Bali said on social media.

In a tweet, Bali said the company plans to unwind major initiatives like public health, remote patient monitoring, hardware and chronic care programs to focus on its "core primary care and urgent care service."

Bali said the workforce reductions impacted "incredibly talented people" across all roles and put out the call for other digital health companies looking to make new hires.

Several former Carbon Health employees also posted on LinkedIn today about the layoffs that impacted "several teams" as part of corporate restructuring.

The company's layoffs back in June impacted about 250 employees. At that time, Bali cited the volatile capital markets as one key reason for the layoffs as well as concerns about the company's bottom line.

"We're still optimistic about the future. The current market conditions force us to be more diligent, focused and patient. We're sad to see our colleagues go, but I couldn't be more proud of what we achieved together," Bali wrote.

A representative from Carbon Health did not respond to a request for comment.

The company had reportedly been in talks to license its self-developed EHR (electronic health record) to other companies, Axios reported in December.

Digital health companies enjoyed a pandemic-fueled boom in the past two years but changing market conditions have forced some startups to downsize and restructure their operations.

Founded in 2015, the San Francisco-based company combines brick-and-mortar clinics with virtual services and operates 100 clinics in 16 states, along with Reno, Nevada, Seattle, New York City and several cities in California including San Francisco, Sacramento, San Diego and Los Angeles.

Carbon Health provides virtual care in 35 states plus Washington, DC.

In 2021, Carbon Heath was on a growth spree with several acquisitions including virtual diabetes management startup Steady Health, representing its first push into remote, device-driven management of chronic conditions. In October 2021, it picked up Alertive Healthcare, a remote patient monitoring company, to flesh out at-home monitoring.

It also bought two separate clinic chains to expand its national primary care footprint. Carbon Health picked up Southern Arizona Urgent Care’s nine clinics in Tucson, Arizona, and Med7 Urgent Care’s four clinics in Sacramento, California.

The digital health startup also raised a whopping $350 million in 2021, boosting its valuation to a reported $3.3 billion. Since the pandemic started in early 2020, the company doubled its full-time staff to 1,600 employees as it opened over 80 clinics in 12 states and expanded its virtual clinics to 23 states.

Carbon Health inked a partnership with virtual care company Hims & Hers to offer patients in California with direct access to providers for in-person medical appointments at clinics.

The company had been building on the assets it acquired to expand into RPM and chronic care. It launched a metabolic assessment program using continuous glucose monitors to help identify patients at high risk for diabetes. Building on its Steady Health acquisition, in April, the company launched its own integrated diabetes care program incorporating at-home CGM devices. Based on Bali's statement, those programs will be shuttered.

The company has raised $522 million to date, according to Crunchbase, backed by Blackstone's Horizon and a long list of institutional and individual investors including Atreides, Homebrew, Hudson Bay Capital, Intersect Capital, Fifth Wall, Lux Capital, Silver Lake Waterman and funds and accounts managed by BlackRock.

With the hefty funding round in July 2021, executives said the company was looking ahead toward a goal line of 1,500 clinics by 2025 “to become the largest primary care provider in the U.S.”

In September, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts announced it was teaming up with Carbon Health and Firefly Health to launch a new virtual primary care offering.