AI and the Next Generation of Emergency Response with LogicMark CEO Chia-Lin Simmons

Summary

In this conversation, Chia-Lin Simmons, CEO of LogicMark, discusses the evolution and innovation of medical alert technology, particularly focusing on the Freedom Alert Max device. She highlights the importance of user-friendly design, advanced features like fall detection and GPS, and the integration of caregiver connection tools to enhance family coordination and support for seniors. The conversation also touches on the significance of over-the-air updates for improving device functionality and battery life, ensuring that the technology remains effective and reliable for users. In this conversation, Chia-Lin Simmons discusses the importance of backup systems in caregiving, the benefits of two-way communication in emergency response devices, and the cost and accessibility of these products. She also explores future innovations in personal emergency response systems, emphasizing the need for hyper-personalized care and the prevention of falls among seniors. The discussion highlights the stigma associated with medical alert devices and the importance of making them more appealing to users.

Takeaways

Chia-Lin Simmons is the CEO of LogicMark, focusing on innovative medical alert technology.
LogicMark has been a pioneer in medical alert products since 2007.
The Freedom Alert Max offers advanced features like fall detection and GPS.
User experience is prioritized in the design of medical alert devices.
Over-the-air updates enhance device functionality and battery life.
Caregiver connection features allow families to coordinate care effectively.
The device aims to provide a sense of security and independence for seniors.
LogicMark's products are designed to be user-friendly for seniors.
The importance of social connectivity in medical alert devices is emphasized.
The conversation highlights the need for continuous improvement in medical alert technology. Backup systems in caregiving can alleviate isolation.
Two-way communication enhances emergency response effectiveness.
Cost-effective options are available for personal safety devices.
Hyper-personalized care is the future of emergency response technology.
Stigma around medical alert devices can be reduced with better design.
AI can help predict and prevent falls in seniors.
Monitoring patterns can provide valuable insights for caregivers.
Personal safety devices should be user-friendly and appealing.
The importance of trial periods for new technology products.
Data privacy is crucial in the development of health monitoring systems.

Sound Bites

"We want to have updatable over the items."
"We actually have GPS on these devices."
"We call it triple protection."
"It's basically like a phone."
"You should always try before you buy."
"We want to make it less of a stigma."
"We want to know shifts."
"We need to be better and better at it."
"One in four will fall."
"We're trying to be a little bit cooler."

Chapters

00:00 Introduction to LogicMark and Chia-Lin Simmons
02:42 Innovations in Medical Alert Technology
06:51 The Freedom Alert Max: Features and Benefits
10:29 Technical Expertise and User Experience
13:33 Over-the-Air Updates and Battery Life
21:21 Caregiver Connection Features and Family Coordination
26:26 The Importance of Backup in Caregiving
28:00 Enhancing User Experience with Two-Way Communication
30:40 Cost and Accessibility of

Transcript

Janet Engel (00:01.449)
Hello everyone and thank you for being with me today. My guest is Shailene Simmons and she is the CEO of Logic Mark. Shailene, thank you for being with us today.

Chia-Lin Simmons (00:13.855)
It's nice to be here, Janet. Thank you.

Janet Engel (00:16.319)
Shailen, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and Logic Mark?

Chia-Lin Simmons (00:22.431)
Sure. So Shailen Simmons, CEO of Logic Mark. I've been here since June of 2021. I was brought on board to the company as a pivot CEO. The company has been around for quite a while, I believe going all the way back to 2007. And so I am the third CEO of the company's tenure. We have been as a company, you know.

going back to 2007 have been sort of a ground breaker in terms of a lot of different technology. Back in the old days when we first started, a lot of medical alert products, which is a business that we're in, were basically things that you actually had to do as part of a home securities system. so they were watching your home, so they thought they'd put a device on you and watch your family as well, or your parent. And so...

We were very revolutionary at the time in 2007 by creating a product where if you push the button, it just goes straight to 911 without the sort of need for a recurring subscription service that was very costly and continues to be potentially costly for some of the seniors out there that might be on fixed or lower income. And so, you know, this is a tradition we've held on to at the company. We still have unmonitored products that take people directly to 911.

In fact, we are a believer in sort of advancing technology. So oftentimes these devices, don't, know, they monitor products, they don't have things like fall detection. So we literally just introduced, upgraded our heritage product to include even fall detection because we think that's so crucial for a senior success. And so since I've been on board, we not only have these heritage products that we have that are on monitor, but we also brought on board advanced technology.

in category areas like advanced fall detection technology, geofencing for those with early onset memory care or Alzheimer's issues, as well as a host of features for caretakers out there to coordinate care for their loved ones. And so it's been really an exciting time to be at this company because we feel like, you know, with the transformation of IoT and AI, we really could do so much more on a medical alerts business. And we feel like we're in a forefront of actually bringing those

Janet Engel (02:19.967)
you

Chia-Lin Simmons (02:42.013)
really cool technology features in applied AI, for example, into what most people don't focus a lot on, which is medical alerts and personal safety.

Janet Engel (02:54.079)
Okay, well thank you for that very comprehensive explanation. Tell me about the Freedom Alert Max. It's being touted as the most advanced medical alert on the market. What are the key features that set it apart from other devices?

Chia-Lin Simmons (03:10.623)
So, you know, we are very much focused on trying to make things easier for the seniors.

So one of the things that people always talk about is like, gosh, like I don't need a medical product because I have a cell phone. But of course, as we know, many seniors don't like to carry their bulky cell phones everywhere. And so they leave it and they're out there gardening or doing something. And then they have a fall and they're nowhere within reach of a product that they need. And so we spend a lot of time thinking about what is a form factor need to be? What are the features that people really want? And so we came up with a product that is, I would call it like a two for one.

Basically, the product is medical alerts first. So we actually have the updatable advanced fall detection features, the geo-fencing for Alzheimer's memory care, amazing apps again, of course. But we also add things like unlimited calling for your family. And the other sort of piece that is really sort of like we think exciting is, you know, oftentimes, like if you fall, you know, you can't talk and there's no capability to respond.

so that's why we have file detection. But we added basically a video check-in, which means that when you actually trigger emergency, whether or not you like the file detection or a button push, then your family members can actually utilize the camera in the front and the back of this device. And in essence,

be able to sort of check in and see whether or not in fact mom and dad did fall, right? And so that way, like if you sort of see the front camera or the back camera, you have the capability to say, oh my gosh, like that camera looks like it's blank on and it's, know, I'm facing down or I can't see anything. So it means that she's definitely down. Like I gotta get there and, you know, get 911 and 24 seven monitor service will get 911 and I'm heading there to see mom and dad right now, right? And so to us, we also built in

Chia-Lin Simmons (05:07.635)
features of safety so that means that like for a senior the last thing we want probably as seniors you know when we get there is to have our children treat us like children and so there's no like random drop-ins via video you know via video cam like suddenly their face pops up and like mom dad but what are you doing are you walking are you doing taking your meds all of that stuff none of that is possible unless there's a triggering sort of mechanism for an emergency and so as a senior you could retain your

privacy that as caretakers you have the possibility of popping in and making sure that like the emergency is truly like an emergency and not like a false alarm.

know, our fault detection is advanced and continues to be updated via, know, updatable fault detection. We made the form factor for this really small so that you're not a senior carrying this, which is a, know, an iPhone. It's huge. Like my hands can't grip something like this big. And so this is something that's wearable, clippable, small, but you still get to call unlimited calling with your family members in an easy, like to use way. could be pre-programmed by your family members.

Janet Engel (06:02.888)
Mm-hmm.

Chia-Lin Simmons (06:16.767)
that the most important phone numbers are there. So we try to incorporate everything that we're seeing in a marketplace that people are asking for into one device so that you're not carrying like a jitterbug as well as carrying like a medical product because really people don't want to carry two things they just want to carry one.

And we don't think that there's anything else in the market that actually compares to it because most of the items like jitterbug They're basically a cell phone. You you can browse and you could take pictures with their grandkids And that's awesome for those that just want a smart phone

Janet Engel (06:44.51)
Mm-hmm.

Chia-Lin Simmons (06:51.411)
but it doesn't have advanced fall detection, geo-fencing, video check-in with caretakers for emergencies, they don't have any of that. And they're still really big, right? At the end of the day, it's not wearable, so if you're really gonna walk around as a senior with this very big cell phone, it's actually very difficult to sort of carry that around. Again, the older you get, your grip changes, it's just part of maturing, and so we don't.

that that's really probably the form factor that is the best way to serve the customer base.

Janet Engel (07:26.735)
So one feature you mentioned that I really like is that the homeowner is able to use it to make phone calls or connect with family members, friends. So it doubles also as a social connectivity platform.

Chia-Lin Simmons (07:43.219)
Yes. And the reason why we also, you know, do it as a sort of, you know, a smart.

protection communicator, right, is that you can call your family members unlimited calling, right? And so you can actually stay connected and we can use this device with a decent size screen. Again, not too big. I mean, this is very difficult to move, but a decent size screen so that when we roll out more additional advanced features such as medicine reminder, like we can show you a medicine reminder is coming up.

Janet Engel (08:05.727)
Mm-hmm.

Chia-Lin Simmons (08:18.387)
you so you can visually see it, can hear it, you can see it as part of that. And so we can keep rolling like free to try sort of features for you. We want to have a product that we think is persistent. You can actually use it to stay connected with your family because still can, they can use it as a reminder for the future. I've seen, I'm one of those people who like love IOT products. And so I saw somebody with those lamps recently where you could give one to your grandmother and you could keep them for yourself. And if you touch the

lamp. They get sent like the lamp goes off and it shows that you're thinking about them. Like we're thinking about like are there cool ways we can do things like that where you can still stay socially connected as well to people. But now you have a device where you can do that and it's easy hopefully you know to use and it's small. Like you don't have to feel like you're carrying this ginormous thing and you want to go out gardening and you're carrying your ginormous iPhone.

Janet Engel (09:14.777)
Yeah, because sometimes your iPhone doesn't fit in your pocket. You're right. And I garden so I can relate to doing an activity such as that one.

Chia-Lin Simmons (09:25.489)
Yeah, and again, you know, the iPhone's great. But again, if you know, carrying around, if you have less of a grip, you know, you want to wear it around the neck, but it's super heavy because it's a heavy phone. Really, ultimately, it's very difficult for people to hear this. mean, I know I hear it all the time. Like, why don't I just get a watch or like a smartwatch?

Janet Engel (09:38.59)
Yeah.

Chia-Lin Simmons (09:49.243)
And that will help me with fall detection. And the reality is that when you look at the research, people swing their arms all the time. It's part of hopefully being mobile and being active that actually can be triggered, you know? And so actually capturing falls in the core body is actually more important than and more accurate than actually putting it on your wrist. I mean, we look at this features all the time.

But we look at making sure that we have advanced features for the single most important thing, which is if you could wear it on your core, that actually will help us more than anything else.

Janet Engel (10:29.247)
Okay, great. And tell me about the technical expertise that's required. I know earlier you mentioned the jitterbug and years ago, I remember when the jitterbug came out back in 2010, I had many patients as an occupational therapist that had it. And the reason why their caregivers got it for them was because it was very easy to use. How does your product

compared to that.

Chia-Lin Simmons (11:01.821)
Yeah, I think when Jitterbug first came out, the reason why it was so easy to use is because the buttons were so big. And, you know, it was not complex. It didn't have a lot of bells and whistles. And in many ways, like, your hearts at Jitterbug, right? Their Smart 4, you know, is literally like, like an iPhone knockoff. It's huge. And the only way that they've done it is just, you know, they have an emergency button on the screen at the top left, and that's the only emergency feature as a phone.

How we differ is that, again, the goal here is to make the buttons big. And so we can actually make, instead of actually having you push the numbers, right? Like most seniors, like this is why contacts lists are so important. Like they don't, they really, like most of us only call like three or four people at a time, like, you know, part of the immediate family. So you, as a family member, could use the Caretaker app and actually pre-program and say like, you know, Johnny.

and like, you know, daughter Beth and like whatever you sort of need. And then it just says like, this is who you're calling and it's big, right? And that way you're not trying to like look at the big dialing numbers because I think the Jitterbug in the early days was just basically a feature phone and it was very small and the buttons are big. So you can actually type better, but.

Pre-programming from a contact list, but making a contact list like better curated and also naming the contacts in a way that is easier for you to understand, especially if you have memory care is really important. And so if it's suddenly can't remember the name of Johnny and you can say like, it's, know, young boy, you know, then you can actually have that, you know, and that that's, you know, the way to do it. But we give you the flexibility as caretakers to help sort of manage that. So for example,

should that change, you know, that you don't remember your loved one's name, it change the context to sort of reflect the new name and all of that too, right? So there's ways to sort of manage this and it gives us a little bit more control than a manual sort of like button. It gives us a screen-based button that you can control, you can make potentially up size and so forth, so.

Janet Engel (13:01.561)
Mm-hmm.

Janet Engel (13:16.767)
That's genius. I never thought about that, but that's a very relevant example that you just provided. Tell me about the Freedom Alert Max, how it offers over the air updates. What does that mean?

Chia-Lin Simmons (13:33.929)
Yeah, so why over the updates are important overall is that, you today when you look at a lot of products out in the market, let's just say like, you know, small medical products, right? They tout basically being small. And yes, this is a little bit bigger than your typical sort of like medical products, one button on it. The reason why you want to have updatable over the items is because one, our job is to get better and better at detecting falls.

One of the major sort of gripes that people have is that like the fault detection isn't very good. So it goes off all the time. So two things actually result from that, which is they often turn off all detection thinking that because it's triggering so much, they just want to turn off. It's very annoying or, and then when they need it, it's not available, right? Because they fall and then they can't, you know, somehow can speak. can't push a button. It's not available to them. Or the flip side of that is that, you know, it's triggering all the time.

And so it's done in a way so it's draining the battery more because the more triggering the fault detection algorithm is, the more it goes off consistently, the more it drains the battery. So we are constantly updating to make sure we're looking at the algorithms and detecting and understanding what's a fall and not a fall. So if you actually had a fall or what triggers a fall and it turns out it wasn't, you're like, not a fall. So we're like, okay, what are the conditions and speeds of

which like this is happening. And so we take note like, okay, this speed and like this, this isn't really a fall. So we sort of update and we sort of learn. So there's a AI component to us learning basically like what's really a fall and what's not a fall so that when we over the update, the next update we have, it's a smarter AI that basically understands your falls. Our AI also understands like, if you're sitting here talking and your body generally is like sort of still, then it's not going to

to trigger as much, right? Because you're still, and so it's not sucking basically battery life. Battery life is really important. So we're taking all of those components, and so when we're better at basically, you know.

Janet Engel (15:38.397)
battery.

Chia-Lin Simmons (15:46.655)
figuring out what's a fall, what's not a fall. We're better at like, your body is still, so you're sitting or you're relaxing, you're doing whatever you need to do for a long period of time, but you're still like, you were moving, but there didn't seem to be a fall, so the detection like issue, then you're just sort of eating or doing whatever you're doing. This doesn't seem like a fall. So it basically becomes quiet in a kind of like AI sleep mode. So all of those things can get better and better.

Janet Engel (16:14.151)
Mm-hmm.

Chia-Lin Simmons (16:14.579)
when you actually have over the year updates to basically make those available because we're learning and you're not basically static. The best example I can give is like for those people who remember those old days where we actually have maps in the car. And so when these things come up, then like your map doesn't show it. So you look like you're driving in some kind of like weird turf with like no street on it. And then the only way to update those maps is if you take it to the Honda dealership and then they like charge you and then they update the computer in the shop and you got to give your car like there for like a period of time to get that done.

Janet Engel (16:26.927)
Mm-hmm.

Chia-Lin Simmons (16:44.513)
Nowadays, we over the air update on new features and safety and security patches and all of that in our phone. Why wouldn't we want that for a medical lip product? It's nonsensical to not have that available and for us to be getting better at providing service all the time.

Janet Engel (16:54.717)
Yeah.

Janet Engel (17:04.295)
Well, that makes a lot of sense and that's a great feature because it's seamless and you know, like you said, just happens automatically. You mentioned battery life. Generally, how long does the battery life last in a phone that I would say for most people, we don't have triggering events multiple times a day. So how long would you say it would last for the average person?

Chia-Lin Simmons (17:30.003)
I think because, you know, one of the things that people don't want to talk about and it's actually hard to hear is that, you know,

we want to have GPS on these devices because we're worried that we can't find our loved ones if they had it like an emergency event. So for things like FAMACs, for phones, for all of those things, you know, we actually have GPS and the GPS in order to understand where you are is pinging the cell tower every so often at some kind of rate to figure out where you are so that if they need you, can locate you. So because of that, it's about typically like a charge of 48 hours

If you're basically turned, you know, if you're turned on in a way that is constantly paining. And this is why we also like are constantly trying to look at how do we over the, or update the device to like, as we're learning things, like when you're still at this like period of time, like you're really not, you're sleeping or whatever, then we should like go into sleep mode, which then sucks less energy. So in that particular way, like, you know, if you turn off all detection and there are people who do, right? Like again,

They like having an emergency access, like the phone, the emergency button, all of those things. they're just like, automatic file detection, I won't need it. So when they turn it off, these things have a longer charge, like five, six days. But don't quote me on this. I need to double check on this as well for myself. But it's a longer period of time. But the more services you have, the more it's taxing the...

the features. think that basically these are devices that you charge next to your bed the way that you charge a phone overnight. we have a device that basically, now we have a device that last actually our our guardian 911 plus because it's not GPSing. It's a monitor product. You know it's not sucking up energy because it's really truly like a 911 emergency button.

Janet Engel (19:15.871)
Okay, well thank you for answering that.

Chia-Lin Simmons (19:35.903)
and you could talk to the operator through the device. So don't need a phone. It's just this one device. This charge is six to 12 months. So I often charge it and then I, because I have it in my drawer, I forget about it. It lasts six to 12. And it's because it's does not have GPS. It's your way to basically push a GPS button, like emergency button, talk to 911 and get help. But you have to be conscious to do this. Yeah.

Janet Engel (20:00.355)
You said six to 12 months?

Chia-Lin Simmons (20:04.563)
So for the people who just want an emergency 911 button, we,

Janet Engel (20:08.04)
and

Chia-Lin Simmons (20:10.431)
advocate for this device. And we have a portfolio of products. We advocate for this device for people who just truly need a 911 emergency button to just wear around the neck, tuck it into their pockets, super small. You charge it once, you know, and it's very good about like being very loud, actually, because my husband's like, I could hear it in the next room. Because it's like charge, you need to charge the batteries low. Our devices do that, they'll remind you to charge. And so this charges six months at a time. Yeah, a minimum is

Janet Engel (20:38.271)
Wow.

Chia-Lin Simmons (20:40.395)
Sometimes people actually have said that it's been 12, but I always go more by six months. But it's a truly great device if you're really just wanting core basics, no recurring billing, easy to use products. And then the more advanced you get, the more features, the social connectivity, all of that, then you're using basically closer to a cell phone capability. And the GPS features will definitely drain the battery a little bit more.

Janet Engel (21:08.911)
Okay, tell me about the caregiver connection features. How do they work and how do they help families stay informed about their loved one's well-being?

Chia-Lin Simmons (21:21.843)
Yeah, I actually have a personal example for this as well. So we live in a different state.

When my mother-in-law was alive, she was living in Pennsylvania. And so my husband and I live here and my sister-in-law lives closer in the sort of New Jersey side. So she had a fall incident at her retirement community. And my sister-in-law is amazing. She's a wonderful woman and she took care of it. And then we didn't have a, and we had a catch-up call a few days later, a weekly sort of catch-up and we found out about it. And it was several days later.

later, right? And so it's really difficult when the reality is that there's so many people who love, you know, their elderly.

relatives, but you're not sort of always constantly up to date. And so what the app does is it actually helps basically bring together what we call the care village. And so that is potentially the next door neighbor as part of your care team. And, you know, my sister in law who lives like 20 minutes away and us who live really far away, but want to know what's going on, it allows us all to be connected to this platform so that we all know what's going on. my mother in law had a fall incident and she was wearing one of our devices. She would have, we would have

Janet Engel (22:27.123)
Mm-hmm.

Chia-Lin Simmons (22:36.353)
known. Now we know that you know my sister-in-law we would have been able to say she's the primary right she's the one they should contact first and so you know have we all lived closer together maybe you know my sister-in-law and brother-in-law were going on vacation and so we can take turns coordinating using the app on who's on call for example or if we're both having to deal with work then

Janet Engel (22:57.67)
Mm-hmm.

Chia-Lin Simmons (23:00.723)
we, you know, the next door neighbor might be on call. So there's a way to sort of coordinate error and who's like the primary on call using the app.

Janet Engel (23:04.585)
Hmm.

Chia-Lin Simmons (23:09.263)
And we also know most importantly, the realities is that what if I was passing a tunnel at a time of emergency? So we actually call it triple protection, which is we're on call for our loved ones as part of the village, but God forbid something happens because we're in a movie theater, the ringer's off or passing through something. The 24-7 monitor service then kicks in.

and then there's 911. So it's triple protection versus just feeling like you're always, no matter what, being pushed to a 24-7 monitor service when the reality is sometimes that you may use the FA Max and say like, oh my gosh, you know, sprained my ankle.

Like you don't really want 24 seven monitor service and a random stranger to be like, Hey, you know, what's up? You really want your kids to know, like I sprained my ankle. You might want to come over and get this done. and taken care of. And so we feel like there's multiple layers of communications there and the app helps us coordinate sort of levels of care with the family and also coordinate.

Janet Engel (24:09.959)
Well, that's fascinating. I've never heard of an app that coordinates care where people can, you know, be, make themselves the caregiver at that time and then switch over to someone else. I've never heard of anything like that.

Chia-Lin Simmons (24:25.215)
Yeah, calendaring because you know one of the loneliest things

it is to be a caretaker, right? Oftentimes the burden falls on one person more than others. And so, I grew up in an environment where we were a sort of multi-family, like all my uncles and aunts kind of live nearby. Like we lived in the same household, my grandmother lived with us. And so there was like all those kids, high school kids and like, multiple age kids and everybody's sort of watching out for each other. And I think that that's not the way that we live anymore.

Janet Engel (24:50.035)
Mm-hmm.

Chia-Lin Simmons (25:01.217)
much more nuclear family oriented, know, family members might live in different states. And so in a way we're trying to replicate that sort of village, actual village experience where people are multi-generational households together, where somebody is always able to look for grandma as she's aging and, you know, maybe the aging is watching the babies, you know, like all of those things can't really quite replicate anymore. So what we're doing is to build, I mean, in many ways that the care village came out of my sort of own grown-up

experience of being part of a multi-generational household where you know there was always one of us if my mom was busy for work like I was driving at 16 so I took my grandmother to the doctors but you don't really have that anymore that's really not really available so what we've done is we've created a service that allows us to try to build that a little bit.

Janet Engel (25:45.193)
Mm-hmm.

Chia-Lin Simmons (25:53.117)
So nothing's going to really fully replicate that, but what we're trying to do is to provide that sort of capability.

Janet Engel (26:00.081)
Yeah, and it really ensures coverage 24 hours a day because you can verbally have that job be assigned to someone.

Chia-Lin Simmons (26:14.247)
It can. And so the reality is that like, look, there is a 24 seven monitoring service on board in case of an emergency. So, you know, you can go to sleep and, know,

If you're just really tired and didn't wake up and you're the person on call, like, you know that there's a backup for you. And if the service, you know, if the app is like, the Apple contact, everybody and say like, mom had an emergency fall. And so everybody will know about it, you know, and if somebody doesn't respond, like, you know, then other people know about it. So there is a capability to sort of know that. Right. And so I think that's sort of the challenge because often then the caretaking can be isolating.

And there is no 24-7 backup, you know, with the monitoring service. And so if you have the monitoring service, you actually have, you can share also caretaking with maybe some family members, right? Maybe, you know, the grandson's on call, you know, today because he's, you know.

doing homework and mom and dad's out on a date. And so, you know, they will contact him first, right? In case of an emergency and that's okay. And so there is always a feeling of like, I'm just on call just in case anything happens. And oftentimes, you know, it doesn't happen, but if it does, you know, there's the grandson who's 16 on duty, but also 24 seven monitoring service with adult people is also on coverage as well. So you're never feeling like you're left without coverage in one way or the other.

Janet Engel (27:34.236)
Right.

Janet Engel (27:44.635)
Okay, well that's Shailen, tell me about the two-way voice communication feature on your devices and how does this capability enhance the user experience and emergency response?

Chia-Lin Simmons (28:00.797)
Yeah, I mean, you so for FA Max, it's basically like a phone. So it is two way communications and it's actually fantastic that way, right? So in a sense, again, you want to carry it persistently because it's your cell phone too. And so you'll want to carry it and it doesn't look like an old granny thing. So like, you you feel like you're marked as an old person. And I think that's really important to actually make people feel like they're not, you know.

They're not.

aging in a way that is negative, right? I think there's a lot of persistent sort of feeling that having a two-way communications device can be perceived as, you know, I'm frail. And I don't think that most of our vibrant sort of aging population want to feel this way. That's it. This sometimes could be just too much for some people. So we really feel like all of our devices have two-way communication devices, even down to the monitor products. Because again, asking people to persistently remember to carry a cell phone during

an emergency isn't always the case because you know I don't know about anybody else but sometimes I put my cell phone somewhere and I forget where it is like and I'm 52 years old and like I'm not quite ready for a device yet but I put it down and I don't remember where it is and so in a time of emergency you just can't have it so the problem is is if you just have a device that just calls for an emergency without the capability to do two-way communications then you may not be able to get help when you need it and so that's why even down to the unmonitor products we actually have to

Janet Engel (29:27.807)
right.

Chia-Lin Simmons (29:31.237)
buttons and it's basically a two-way communicator, right? And so you push the button, this is the only device you need if all you need to do is reach 911. You should be able to talk to it, talk to 911 service, tell them where you are, that you need help. And I think that for everybody, that's the safest protection. I mean, we believe in that so much that we believe everybody should have personal safety. So our ASTRA product connects to the cell phone because I don't know any teenager who can forget this because they all

So this is an emergency button for them because they'll put it in their pocket and you're really fending off, know somebody you're not gonna be like let me unlock this with my face and like fight off my know attacker at the same time, right? And for the aging population who is like active 65 year old 66 year old who's doing a hike they're gonna put their cell phones in their pocket because they're on a hike but they're gonna clip this onto their shirt and Then you know push the button

Janet Engel (30:15.005)
Right.

Chia-Lin Simmons (30:30.651)
and they don't have to have the app launched, they don't have to any of that, they just need to push the button. And it becomes a communicator.

Janet Engel (30:40.723)
What are the costs of these different products that you've described today?

Chia-Lin Simmons (30:45.247)
Yeah, you know, FA Max because it has a fully sort of full loaded features. has the, you know, emergency check in via video, you know, the geofencing, the apps, the monitor service. It's, you know, it's a device cost that I believe it's free and I apologize because I...

I'm not always sort of looking at pricing structures for ourselves, but like the FA Max is in a price point of.

Chia-Lin Simmons (31:20.099)
It's $34.99 a month. yeah. And if you want fall detection, it's additional $9.99. Again, you don't have to have it, but we actually, in order to encourage people to try it out, we're giving away three months free. Geofencing is $9.99. Some people need geofencing, not fall detection. So it's separate. It's $9.99 a month.

Janet Engel (31:22.643)
Okay.

Chia-Lin Simmons (31:42.559)
And again, we like to encourage people to try it. So we're just giving away three months. I'm a big believer in try before you buy. You should always try before you buy. Don't take our word for it, try it. Our Freedom Alert Mini is up to $34.99 a month, and it's super tiny. It's very tiny. so that also, we separate those fault detection and geo-fencing features out because we realize not everybody wants it.

Janet Engel (32:12.815)
well that's great that you can tailor the price points to different products so people can have it match their need but also match their budget.

Chia-Lin Simmons (32:24.093)
Yeah, and I think that like, again, the goal here is to try to be, know, try to make things really convenient and easy for our customers. Ultimately, at the end of the day, you know, maybe people want to graduate into things that are much more full features as they are interested and able to, or.

have the need for. Maybe they're just starting out as something that is easy to use and they're trying things because they're not really sure they want to wear these old people devices. This is what I hear all the time. I don't know if I'm old enough. I don't need this old people feature. Fair enough.

Janet Engel (33:03.378)
Well, you know, the reality is that all of us think we are about 10 or 15 years younger than what our chronological age is. So we'll never be old enough, right?

Chia-Lin Simmons (33:16.645)
Yeah, and I, you know, like I can totally get it, right? My mother-in-law was a 40-year art teacher. She was stylish and just dressed impeccably. And when she was using one of those devices, not ours, you know, it was this weird honking like.

you know, what looks like a smaller size remote control hanging around her neck. was definitely not making her outfit look cool. went off on a, you know, triggered accidentally when we were having ramen for lunch at this restaurant in Oakland. And it was like a moment of everybody just kind of like that silent. And everybody turned and looked at her because it was screaming at like Mrs. Becker, are you okay? She was super embarrassed when she's wearing this device that's not an attractive and she just, she didn't feel very good wearing these.

nice right and our job is to make it less of a stigma like this just looks like a cool little cell phone right you know so nobody's like my gosh you're such a raging person you just look like a cool person carrying like a super cool like smart you know cell phone

Janet Engel (34:08.031)
Mm-hmm.

Janet Engel (34:18.079)
Well, no one wants to wear an ugly necklace or an ugly bracelet.

Chia-Lin Simmons (34:22.313)
Yeah, but you don't want to make and do something where you're going to make it less full featured.

mean, our interest is that when we've seen a lot of things where like for the elderly, the file detection devices actually on the cell phone, the algorithm and app, and then you wear this really pretty sort of like jewelry looking product, and that's great and looks beautiful, but that's less accurate if you're aging, right? As you're more aging population, because again, that only works if within a certain range of Bluetooth from the cell phone. So we don't recommend that for those who are aging, who are like more senior, right?

Janet Engel (34:45.417)
Mm-hmm.

Chia-Lin Simmons (34:59.229)
I always think of these things as like there's a journey that is customer journey that we have with our customers and so to me it's like you know our Aster product it's $9.99 a month and you use it with a smartphone. I have my daughter on this and she's 16 right because she's gonna go off to college in a year and a half and so she's not gonna remember to turn on her app before she leaves the library in the dark.

after studying and during emergency, right? And she's not going to remember. And if she leaves it on persistently, it's going to drain her phone. So we created products and we are very good at engineering so that you actually just have to push the button and it'll know that you are close to, you know, you're close to your phone. Then you're good. Like you have, you know, the, service and emergency that you need. Right. And we think that like, that's sort of, that's a young person journey. So people can be part of a customer journey with us as young

unless it's 16 year old.

because who doesn't need personal protection and safety? And then if you're active 65, you're going hiking, you have your cell phone in your pocket, because it's kind of heavy, so you're always having it in your pocket, then at least this is something that is an emergency button that you can have, and that's easy to use if you trip and fall, right? And you can talk, and you can actually, GPS is a location, and this is just 9.99, so you're a young active senior graduating into things that's more robust, because your journey

Janet Engel (35:57.278)
Mm-hmm.

Chia-Lin Simmons (36:27.309)
in the early journey with us is that you don't need it as a robust product as A-Max, right? But when you get there, we hope that you're the trusted partner that you have for personal safety. And you could graduate into a device that doesn't make you feel like an old person or somebody who's needy.

Right? Because the reality is that we all want to live independently, but as caretakers, we want people to fly and to be free and to live independently, but we're just scared. And so we just want to make sure that we put a little safety net under them. And I think that's we be doing as caretakers, allowing people to fly and, you know, be able to sort of provide them with a safety net that they need.

Janet Engel (37:00.895)
just look right, right.

Janet Engel (37:10.815)
Shailen, tell me about the future. What advancements in the personal emergency response systems technology do you envision and how is LogicMark preparing to meet the evolving needs in the care economy?

Chia-Lin Simmons (37:28.585)
Yeah, so, you know, I can't speak for a lot of medical...

and personal safety companies out there. Ultimately, I came out of the tech industry. Prior to coming to this job, I actually had an AI company startup. Before that, I was at Google. I really, in the three and a half years that we've been here for, almost four years, we actually have, I think like more than 20 patents, a lot of them around things like falls, around AI. I think the really future of medical alerts and caring

for aging tech is around applied AI. And so what do I mean by that? I mean that we should be looking at what I would call hyper personalized care. Like we as a service and our technology should be understanding like this is how you operate every, you're active senior and every day at 10 o'clock you go to a yoga class that's four blocks down from your house. And so when you're going down into like a pose it looks like it's a fall.

And so the first time you tell us that you like, this is not an emergency and we would do it discreetly, not scream out on that you, but discreetly say, you okay? And then if you're really not okay, we're helping you. But if you tell us that you're not, you you're fine. And we're seeing the same pattern every day at 10 o'clock at this location. Then we kind of know like you're just doing something active and this is not. So we should have our AI be hyper personalized to you. You're digital. We call it digital twins in our.

Janet Engel (38:32.755)
Yeah.

Chia-Lin Simmons (39:01.857)
ecosystem like your digital twin in the cloud for us basically tells us that every day maybe at 10 o'clock this disease you're doing something active that looks like a fall but it is not a fall right and then but if we're seeing hyper personalized care and applied AI then we should also know that when we see a major shift in your pattern right or even a increasing change in your pattern like is this something that we should be concerned about

And so what we will do is say, Shailen, you're used to be a 5,000 or 10,000 a step a day walker.

and now you're down to five the last three weeks and your blood pressure seems super high. And we did medicine reminder and you didn't respond three times around things like, did you take the meds? And so when we take that pattern and we say, hey, like this is kind of a concerning pattern. What do we know about this pattern? Then we basically shifted and say, in an aggregate people who are 52 and also like need to take blood pressure meds and also like,

a deterioration in number of steps of fall, know, steps that they took away what happened to those people, that cohort of people, oh also women, right, then we see that oh like a you know 40 % or 60 % that a cohort had a fall three months later, 60 % that the cohort had like...

Janet Engel (40:08.166)
Mm-hmm.

Chia-Lin Simmons (40:22.847)
you know, six months later. So 40 % had a fall three months later, 60 % had a fall six months later when we see this pattern shift. Then our job is not to diagnose and say like, this is exactly what it is. We're just saying, there's some potential shift in pattern that could be concerning. So please take this to your doctor. You know, ask your caretakers.

Janet Engel (40:43.505)
Yeah, well that's great alert to that pattern shift.

Chia-Lin Simmons (40:47.391)
And that to us is the future of care, right? The future of care is hyper-personalized to you. Our AI should also be not crazy because we all know about AIs now and how they draw pictures with six toes or six fingers. It's just because they don't know what it means. There's no boundaries. They hallucinate is the word that they use. So we have patents around things like physical fit.

physics engine, because we know that grandma's not doing like crouching tigers, hitting dragons, modeling. When we see this, maybe this is this. And so the AI will...

Create scenarios of like, what is this and what can this be and what are the concerns that we should have, blah, blah. And you're like, look, there's no way that grandma is doing that because that's like crazy Kung Fu stuff, right? So we're trying to ground, like you need to have grounded AI that doesn't, like you're minimizing the hallucinations. You're really wanting to do hyperlized AI work and personalized care so that it knows that your grandmother is this very active senior that's not gonna do this crazy Kung Fu stuff necessarily,

Janet Engel (41:39.209)
You

Chia-Lin Simmons (41:57.625)
doing a lot of yoga so she's definitely flexible so this thing could happen but this is not likely.

Right? So this is how we should be looking at care. And this is what AI can bring to us. Right. And I think that's really the future of where we can go. And also in a way where, you know, we can start looking at what does it be, what does it mean to have like, know, ambient sort of like passive monitoring care where you're retaining your privacy. We are very big on privacy at our company. We tokenize all the data. We put things on edge so that you can't like put it in a cloud and somebody hacks.

You know stuff like we don't want to know that your blood pressure is 165 But we do need to know that like it went from 165 to 200 like, you know, we want to know shifts We don't need to know your personal personal data We will we will protect that with HIPAA which we have right but we the things that concern us is change Change for the positive change for the negative. And so that's you know, the future is about

Janet Engel (42:45.657)
exactly right.

Chia-Lin Simmons (43:00.543)
hyper-focused AI, hyper-personalized care, and also privacy, because we live in a connected world, and then possibly things like passive monitoring, things that are like haptic sensors in your window.

Right? So that when you fall, I actually have a better understanding because our patents are not just tied to one sensor, like accelerometers. Like how, what speed were you going when you took a bite? Right? Like that's important to know, but you know, and it's important to know because combined with a haptic sensor where the window is rattling, it gives us a sense of how hard you fell. Combined with snow.

Janet Engel (43:39.345)
Mmm, that's fascinating. I've never heard of that.

Chia-Lin Simmons (43:42.771)
Combined with things like sound even, right? Like, you know, is this, do we hear a loud crash? is this, you know, window shaking a lot? Like, because you're not gonna necessarily always, you know, like the Max is not waterproof, but the Mini is, so you may wanna wear in the shower, but people fall in the shower and they're not, but.

People don't always wear devices in the shower. So how do we combine sound, for example, with like vibrations so that we're not like keeping in on you when you're taking a shower, but we have enough data to say like, my goodness, this sounds like a problem. we should ask like, Mrs. Becker, did you have a fall? No, I'm fine. I just had a little bit of like drop the bar soap. Sounder really always fine, right?

Janet Engel (44:21.459)
Yeah.

Hmm.

Chia-Lin Simmons (44:24.947)
But we do need to start thinking about what does it mean to basically give as much protection as possible, but in a way that's very sensible and privacy oriented.

Janet Engel (44:36.415)
Well, this is fascinating. Thank you so much Shailene. I learned a lot. really did because even though I'm familiar with other PERS systems, I had really never learned about one that has all of these features and something I really like.

is that it can be used outside of the home. And you use that example of the yoga class. And I can personally relate to that because the Pilates studio that I attend has many yoga classes and one is particularly geared towards older people. And you have many attendees that are in their 70s, 80s and 90s. And it's a large group of them.

So that would totally make sense. And in fact, we had one woman that had a stroke while in the yoga class.

Chia-Lin Simmons (45:34.942)
goodness, okay. Yeah, I will say that again, like this is sort of...

You know, again, everybody goes into a panic when there's an emergency, like you sort of see things like in TV, even when people are like, you know, falls over in a restaurant and he's like, somebody called 911. Well, so the nice thing about wearing one of these devices is that, well, you know what, the device is there literally and you could call 911 and 24 seven monitors should turn on and help you. mean, in many ways, you know, there's such a stigma about wearing medical alert products when all of us in many ways from a personal safety perspective,

should have something that is about personal safety, right? It shouldn't be just such a stigma because that means that you're aging. And I love the idea that 70 and 80 year olds are out there doing yoga because I'm not very flexible and that's super important to be, you know, I think physically fit when you're older, you know, to have this, you know, belimber all those things because the falls, falls are usually, it prefaces a lot of medical issues. And so this is why we're so

Janet Engel (46:12.255)
Mm-hmm.

Chia-Lin Simmons (46:40.417)
interested in actually also predicting. So, you know, what's the likelihood of you having a fall? This is why we do the comparison of our digital twin. Like if we see this pattern, like, are you more likely for a fall? Right? If you have put in that you actually have a dog, we would be like, that's an increased factor of like potential falls, right? Ironically, you know.

Janet Engel (46:52.147)
Mm-hmm.

Janet Engel (47:01.629)
Yeah, because they get in your way. I have two dogs and the one that gets in my way is the large one. She's always either right in front of me or right next to me and I'm always concerned when I'm going down the stairs that she's going to do something to trip me up.

Chia-Lin Simmons (47:09.684)
Mm-hmm.

Chia-Lin Simmons (47:19.687)
Yeah, me too. I have a small dog and she needs a charge. Like it takes her like lot to go up the stairs. So I'm trying to clear the way for her because I'm also worried that if we're going up at the same time that she's going to end up tripping me, I'm going to fall down the stairs. And again, I'm 52. Like, and I don't think that I'm any more limber than maybe, you know, some of the more active seniors out there. I...

you know, that would be a factor of things that we think about as part of the algorithm, right? We're like, hmm, do they own a pet? Are they on like, know, blood thinners? Are they on things that like have a potential sort of factor to deal, like to actually make them more vulnerable, right? To things like this. And so we really are, I think a lot of medical alert companies,

Janet Engel (48:00.445)
Mm-hmm.

Chia-Lin Simmons (48:06.995)
We're all hyper aware and interested in being better at being reactive, being really great reactive technology companies that get you help within the golden hour. Like that is just basic table stakes and we need to be better and better at it. What we're interested in as well as how do get ahead of it? How do we prevent it? Because we know like,

just even based on our rudimentary non-medical capabilities that if you have a fall, like it's just much harder to recover. So.

Janet Engel (48:36.095)
Oh yeah, and most falls result in one of two injuries, which is a hip fracture or a traumatic brain injury. Both very serious. So what you're saying is exactly true, that you want to prevent a fall 100 % of the time.

Chia-Lin Simmons (48:53.471)
Yes, the statistics always sort of astound me. Until I got into this business, I don't think I really understood how much of a risk this is for seniors. And so the CDC showed the data of, know, person over 65, one in four will fall. And that's a really, like that's 25, that's one in four. That's pretty big deal. It is a lot of people, you know, so.

Janet Engel (49:15.263)
That's a lot of people.

Chia-Lin Simmons (49:19.659)
if we do our job right, and that's our interest, basically what do we need to do to help provide enough data for your caretakers? And again, it's not our job to talk about what the sort of needs are, right? That's for professionals. whatever data we can share to help prevent that, that's our interest.

Janet Engel (49:39.999)
Well, thank you so much Shailen. I really enjoyed my time with you and I am going to have a link at the bottom of the show notes where people can go directly to your website and look at all of the different products that you educated us today on.

Chia-Lin Simmons (50:03.045)
Thank you and I really it's such a pleasure to speak with you and you know I hope that this will help some folks to sort of think about what they want in terms of medical products and know that we're you know trying to be a little bit cooler so it's not just a garage open around your neck right so.

Janet Engel (50:19.763)
Right. I think we have proven the market has proven that no one wants that. Thank you, Shailen.

Chia-Lin Simmons (50:26.303)
So thank you so much. appreciate your time here today.