Smartmedical Corp. and INDEX Trading & Investment Sign a Memorandum of Understanding to Reinforce Business Cooperation on Medical Tourism and Licensing Emotion AI "Empath"

TOKYO, March 3, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Smartmedical Corp. and INDEX Trading & Investment (ITI), a member of INDEX Holding, signed an agreement detailing their partnership. Both sides share the objective of cooperating on medical tourism, treating patients from the UAE in Japan, and licensing Smartmedical's Emotion AI "Empath" in GCC countries.

Alliance on medical tourism business

Smartmedical Corp. and INDEX Holding agreed to create a new business model to expand medical tourists from UAE to Japan. "Japan is now rapidly gaining popularity as a medical tourism destination," said Nozumu Shibasaki, CEO of Smartmedical Corp. "Because of our longest life expectancy, Japan attracts medical tourists in tandem with the overall increase in international visitors. By collaborating with INDEX Holding, a leading authority in medical tourism business, we believe we can establish new medical tourism model for visitors from UAE."

Anas Al Madani, Vice Chairman & Group CEO of INDEX Holding, said "We have developed medical tourism business sending patients from UAE to GCC countries, Germany, USA, Korea, and others. Our experiences and knowledge in medical tourism business enable INDEX Holding and Smartmedical, as an innovative medical hub developer, to create a medical tourism platform for UAE patients."

Smartmedical Corp. has developed PCC (Portal Care Clinics) as a new community medical hub for both community residents and commuters, around railway and metro stations mainly in metropolitan Tokyo area. "In order to achieve active and healthy aging, prevention and early detection of disease is essential. This is also true for medical tourists. Our PCC functions as preventive and primary care hub, as a branch of local-core hospitals in cooperation with university hospitals, so that we can provide multiple healthcare services including advanced preventive care and top hospital quality care for medical tourists from UAE," added Mr. Shibasaki. "By connecting our medical networks in Japan with INDEX Holding's medical tourism experiences, we can provide excellent quality medical services." 

Alliance on licensing Emotion AI "Empath"

This MoU defines the licensing alliance of Emotion AI technology "Empath", named and developed by ICT division of Smartmedical Corp. Empath can identify emotions in real-time regardless of language by analyzing multiple physical properties of voice. This technology has been already utilized in various fields such as mental health, call centers, and robotics.

Empath has been already adopted by UAE's government sectors. In October 2016, Empath was officially licensed to the United Arab Emirates' national campaign, "Express Your Love for UAE" hosted by Aqdar (the Khalifa Empowerment Programme for Students) and sponsored by Sheikh Saif. After the campaign, Smartmedical launched Android app "I love UAE" on December 2nd 2016 to celebrate UAE's 45th anniversary of its founding. "This is the best time for us to have a partnership with INDEX Holdings," said Mr. Shibasaki. "After the signing of an agreement with the Ministry of Interior, Empath is highly raising its profile in UAE. INDEX holding is a leading authority in marketing, so this collaboration will boost the presence of Empath immediately in UAE and expands our market into other GCC countries." 

Mr. Al Madani said "In fact, attention to this technology is increasing in UAE. In March 2016, UAE government has established world's first Ministry of Happiness to enhance happiness status among employees and customers. Emotion AI "Empath" will be welcomed at such situation because UAE government is now searching for technologies which can evaluate and improve happiness. Our strong connection with UAE's government sectors and our marketing strategy and experiences in UAE will lead this alliance with Smartmedical on licensing Empath to success."

"INDEX holding penetrates into the ICT market of UAE, so that this alliance makes Empath"

About Smartmedical (http://eng.smartmedical.jp/)

Smartmedical Corp., comprised of PCC and ICT self-care divisions, is the leading authority in developing PCC (Primary Care Clinics), new medical service platforms at and near railway stations in Tokyo and major cities in Japan providing preventive medicine. The ICT self-care division supports PCC projects with advanced ICT technology. It develops and licenses Empath vocal emotion recognition technology for mental health care. In addition to mental health care services, the Web Empath API is also employed in multiple service sectors such as robotics, call centers, and VR.

By analyzing multiple physical properties of the voice such as intonation, pitch, speed, and volume, Empath can identify emotions in real-time regardless of language. It has been developed and refined through collaborative research with prestigious universities such as the University of Tokyo and Nara Institute of Science and Technology. Empath won the first prize of the Japan Resilience Award 2015 and an excellence award at the MCPC Awards in 2015.

For more information on Empath, please visit https://webempath.net/lp-eng/.

SOURCE Smartmedical Corp.