New venture begins two years after leaving Sun
Having been largely out of the public spotlight for the past two years, former Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz emerged today with a startup dedicated to helping families keep the important medical records of loved ones online in a way that he says will ensure their privacy.
Called CareZone, the foundation of the business model is simple: Instead of depending on advertising and the sale of user information, the company will charge users $5 a month or $48 a year.
Schwartz says he was motivated to start the company by experiences he has encountered in caring for a own child and his aging parents.
“We wanted the tools of the modern Internet,” Schwartz tells the Wall Street Journal. “We also wanted absolute strict privacy.”
And he expounds on that theme in a blog post he wrote on the company’s website (Schwartz was both an early and early-morning CEO blogger):
“To be clear, CareZone is a business predicated upon privacy: we are funded by families, not by advertisers, which means you won’t see ads, and you’ll always know our highest priority is to protect your information, not sell it. Unlike a social media site, you’re not our product, you’re our customer.”
You can read CareZone’s privacy policy here (it’s in unusually straightforward language).
Others have attempted without notable success to provide services similar to that being offered by CareZone. Google last year shuttered its own effort, called Google Health.
Scwartz isn’t the only former Sun executive to reenter the fray via a small startup recently. The former long-time head of the company, Scott McNealy, who also left Sun in 2010, announced a social-gaming startup last fall.
Here’s the lineup of “apps” that CareZone will offer, according to a press release:
- Profile – to provide a permanent reference of key information
- Journal – to manage private observations, or have a private conversation among family members
- Medication manager – to organize all meds/therapies in one place
- To Do Manager – to document and assign items to be completed
- Contact list – to provide a common, private directory of family, helpers, vendors, doctors, etc.
- Notes – to store instructions, passwords, account numbers, etc.
- Uploaded Files – a safe place to store reports, advance directives, any other important files you don’t want to lose or might want to share with family or helpers
The service will be offered free for one year to those who sign up before March 17.
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