By Ryan Prete, Feb 8, 2024
Calm, a company focused on mental health and well-being, aims to support happiness and health through its services such as meditation, sleep aids, and relaxation techniques. Founded in San Francisco in 2012, Calm has grown to run the most popular sleep, meditation, and relaxation app in the world; supporting more than 150 million people and 3,500 organizations throughout more than 190 countries.
One of Calm’s most impressive achievements is the company’s ability to adapt to the ever-changing mental health and well-being space. When Calm first launched in 2012, its offerings were simple, focused mostly on limited guided meditations and breathing techniques. In 2024–just as health trends look a lot different than they did 12 years ago–Calm’s products and interface have significantly evolved to address modern-day health needs. Let’s explore how Calm is addressing the health trends and needs of our current society today.
Calm’s commitment to mental health and wellbeing extends beyond simple offerings like guided meditations and sleep stories.
Calm’s content library now includes resources aimed at anxiety, depression, and focus. The company offers a large rolodex of personalized readings from professionals, including “Mindfulness for Everyday Anxiety” by Dr. Tara Brach–which helps users manage anxious thoughts–and “Overcoming Depression” with Headspace’s Andy Puddicombe–which offers techniques for building emotional resilience.
Calm has also partnered with popular therapists, mindfulness teachers, and organizations like Mindful.org and the Jed Foundation, ensuring their content is based on evidence-based practices and reflects diverse perspectives. Additionally, Calm’s “Sleep Stories” cater to various ages and interests, from classic fairy tales to calming nature soundscapes narrated by celebrities including Matthew McConaughey, Harry Styles, Anne Hathaway, Emma Thomspon, and many others.
The “Calm Collective” offers online forums, group meditations, and social media activities to support community connections, while “The Daily Calm Podcast” features interviews with experts and users, offering insights, and inspiration; assisting in providing a sense of belonging to its users. Further, “The Calm Health” program includes partnerships with mental health professionals. Through this program, Calm offers in-app therapy sessions focusing on anxiety, depression, and insomnia. While not a replacement for professional therapy, it provides accessible support for those seeking additional guidance.
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When discussing Calm’s “personalized approach” features, it is noted that the app does not provide fully individualized therapy or treatment plans. However, they do take steps to provide some level of personalization within their app, catering to the diverse needs and preferences of users.
Calm allows users to track their mood and sleep patterns over time, allowing them to identify triggers and adjust their habits accordingly. While not an end-all solution, this data can be helpful for setting personalized sleep goals when paired with a user’s relevant content choices.
Calm offers pre-curated collections of meditations, sleep stories, and music based on specific themes like “Focus at Work,” “Stress Relief,” or “Deep Sleep,” allowing users to quickly access content aligned with their current needs. While collections are pre-defined, and don’t allow users to create their own fully personalized playlists, Calm is working to develop customized collections, potentially incorporating AI-powered recommendations based on individual preferences could enhance personalization. Through AI, Calm has the potential to suggest content based on user engagement and preferences, potentially leading to a more enjoyable and relevant experience.
Calm provides a basic version of its services for free, including core features like guided meditations and sleep stories. This approach enhances accessibility to a broader audience compared to subscription-only competitors.
While research is still ongoing, some studies suggest stress management tools like meditation–offered through Calm–can potentially lead to reduced healthcare costs by lowering the prevalence of stress-related conditions like hypertension, anxiety, and insomnia. This contributes to the value-based care model by potentially lowering overall healthcare costs.
According to Forbes Health, 21% of U.S. adults experienced a mental health condition in 2020. Furthermore, the impact depression and anxiety have on the global economy can be measured in up to $1 trillion in lost productivity each year.
Some health insurance companies, like Aetna and Cigna, offer Calm subscriptions as part of their wellness programs, reducing costs for insured individuals. This aligns with value-based care principles where insurers incentivize healthy behaviors. Calm has also partnered with a number of large corporations, including Spotify, Disney, Apple, Uber, and American Airlines, offering their services to both employees and consumers of these organizations.
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While Calm doesn’t directly engage in traditional remote patient monitoring (RPM) like monitoring vital signs, it engages with aspects of this trend through mental health and well-being features.
Calm offers features for users to track their mood and sleep patterns over time. While these are not clinical-grade measurements, Calm’s capabilities can provide insights into emotional and sleep quality, allowing users to identify triggers and adjust habits accordingly. Additionally, through guided meditations, sleep stories, and breathing exercises, Calm offers tools for users to manage stress and anxiety remotely, potentially improving overall well-being and potentially reducing the need for in-person interventions. Calm also integrates its technology with some wearables, allowing for the collection of certain data, such as heart rate and sleep duration. Calm could potentially offer a more holistic view of well-being in the future.
While Calm isn’t currently positioned as a direct player in traditional RPM for physical health, it could expand its capabilities in the future in a number of ways. Through potential future integration with clinical RPM solutions, Calm could share relevant data with healthcare providers to paint a more-comprehensive picture of patient well-being, with the proper user consent and privacy safeguards. Calm could also offer future AI-powered suggestions or connect users with a wider pool of mental health professionals based on a user’s self-monitored data.
In the dynamic healthcare landscape of 2024, key trends are emerging, notably the increased focus on mental health support. Calm responds to these trends by offering a variety of meditation practices, sleep aids, and community-driven initiatives, enabling individuals to take control of their well-being.
While it stops short of providing fully personalized therapy, Calm enhances personalization with mood tracking, sleep monitoring, and AI-drive recommendations, making its extensive content library more relevant to individual needs.
Acknowledging the significance of affordability, Calm introduces a complimentary version of its services and partners with health insurance providers, supporting the value-based care approach and aiming to decrease the financial impact of stress-related health issues. Although Calm does not monitor vital signs directly, it’s self-tracking features and the potential for future wearable device integration align with remote patient monitoring trends, emphasizing mental and emotional health. Despite its limitations, Calm is carving a niche in the mental health and wellness industry, reaching millions seeking improvement. Learn more about Calm by visiting the Linqto platform.
This material, provided by Linqto, is for informational purposes only and is not intended as investment advice or any form of professional guidance. Before making any investment decision, especially in the dynamic field of private markets, it is recommended that you seek advice from professional advisors. The information contained herein does not imply endorsement of any third parties or investment opportunities mentioned. Our market views and investment insights are subject to change and may not always reflect the most current developments. No assumption should be made regarding the profitability of any securities, sectors, or markets discussed. Past performance is not indicative of future results, and investing in private markets involves unique risks, including the potential for loss. Historical and hypothetical performance figures are provided to illustrate possible market behaviors and should not be relied upon as predictions of future performance.
Ryan is a financial writer for Linqto, known for his original blog content, articles, and other works. He previously worked as a financial writer at PitchBook Data, where he covered private equity, and as a reporter for Bloomberg in Washington D.C.,where he reported on tax policy. Ryan has also reported on cybersecurity policy for Inside Washington Publishers. His work has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, Axios, Yahoo News, and Reuters. He is a graduate of the University of California, Santa Barbara.
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