In a few days, La Poste signed two acquisitions: Happytal in health and Pourdebon.com in food e-commerce. The amount of the transactions was not communicated by the French group.
Digitize the patient journey
Happytal is a start-up that offers two types of services. The first, at the heart of La Poste’s healthcare activities, allows patients to make their pre-admission or their request for a single room online and healthcare establishments to automate requests for reimbursement by complementary organisations.
The second takes the form of a private concierge service to allow patients, caregivers and professionals to easily access products and services. Evian, Pandacraft, Petit Bateau, Playmobil, Birchbox… are thus partners. A member of the FT120 ranking, the company has nearly 100 client healthcare establishments (public hospitals, private clinics and nursing homes) and supports nearly 25,000 patients each month.
The post office has been working with Happytal since December 2021 through an experiment that makes it possible to offer postal services (delivery of letters and parcels, purchase of stamps, envelopes, pre-franked parcels, etc.) in 117 hospitals in France. Through this acquisition, the group aims to become the partner of choice for players in care and autonomy.
It operates from prevention to supporting patients at home via its subsidiary Asten Santé or remote medical monitoring with Nouveal. When returning home after hospitalization, it also supports patients with local services such as the delivery of medication and meals or personal services provided by its subsidiaries AXEO Services or Age d’Or Services.
Expand its food e-commerce services
Also partners since 2016 in the context of a minority stake, La Poste has acquired the food marketplace Pourdebon.com via its subsidiary GeoPost/DPDgroup (parcel delivery). It allows consumers to order fresh products from more than 17,000 references marketed by nearly 550 producers and artisans. The start-up has the particularity of not employing any intermediary and of managing the order from start to finish by offering home delivery.
By integrating the La Poste family, Pourdebon.com will benefit from the strike force of Chronofresh, the specialist in express refrigerated transport, for the delivery of products ordered on the platform. This acquisition seems rather logical since La Poste has already owned Epicery since September 2021, a young shoot which offers merchants the opportunity to open an online store to sell their food products or their flowers. These offers maylive together“, writes the Post Office: Grocery makes it possible to digitize traders and craftsmen and Pourdebon.com is aimed at local farmers and producers.