AARP (formerly the American Association of Retired Persons) has started its AgeTech Investor Network, aimed at helping startups get off the ground in the AgeTech market — which targets older populations.
AARP’s AgeTech Investor Network is a collaboration with AgeTech Capital, expanding onAARP’s mission to support and elevate AgeTech startups by widening the opportunity for investment. Highlighted at the upcoming CES 2025, AgeTech was born from the fact that most technology products have been targeted at young adults. But as boomers and others get older, the need to address tech products across the spectrum of demographics makes more marketing sense and it’s also urgent.
“The goal is to help these great startups scale their products and services, and in turn, it’ll help the create social impact to help the millions of folks in this country who need access to these new services,” said Andy Miller, senior vice president of innovation and product development at AARP Innovation Labs, in an interview with GamesBeat.said. “In this new collaborative, we started targeting investors. So we have over 95 venture capitalists that have joined the collaborative.”
I saw the need for this tech myself as I tried to find tech products to help me take care of my aging mother. I was a sole caregiver in that case — as happens with so many families today — while still needing to be present for other family as well. But I found my mother didn’t take to modern technology — she couldn’t figure out how to use an iPhone — and many products just didn’t serve her needs.
There are a lot of things that tech still can’t do. My mother passed away from dementia in 2024, but I still see the broader need. In the past decade, I have seen a lot of startups take a stab at this and I’ve written about them along the way. But it still feels like an underserved market.
Many of the technologies aimed at seniors use the TV or the telephone as a communications tool. Things like telehealth can work using those tools, but setting up the services in an elderly person’s home is often a challenge. Some assisted living facilities do a better job with this, but that’s not always the case. Some technologies always target caregivers, who are often “sandwiched” between older parents and their children in terms of caregiving duties.
AgeTech Investor Network
The new AARP network and its team of industry experts and innovators are committed to driving change in the AgeTech sector by connecting groundbreaking startups with visionary investors looking to support and shape the growing AgeTech space, Miller said.
For investors, the members of AgeTech Investor Network get exclusive access to a curated selection of high-potential AgeTech startups, comprehensive due diligence support, a vibrant community of like-minded investors, and opportunities to drive meaningful impact.
And for entrepreneurs, startups get access to a vast network of investors, mentorship opportunities, and valuable resources to scale their businesses through incremental funding opportunities and support.
Andy Miller, senior vice president of innovations and product development, said in an interview that AARP started working with startups seven years ago. About five years ago, it started making investments in those startups after they went through its program, which is a customized accelerator. About three years ago, in 2021, it started the AgeTech Collaborative.
Miller noticed that Series A investors were writing bigger checks. While many startups can raise $2 million or $3 million, they’re often not ready for $10 million or $12 million and the economic conditions have not been great for that kind of fundraising. But the startups need some kind of seed round extension from smaller funds, Miller said.
“Over the last few years, we’re starting to see that change. And we are seeing some new funds being able to raise money now and we looked at how we can help the startups in this kind of tweener stage,” he said. “And the concept of AgeTech is really starting to take hold in terms of its economic impact. People the age of 50 are spending money and using technology. It’s in the spotlight.”
AARP’s AgeTech Collaborative‘s purpose is to improve people’s lives as they age. The initiative brings together a one-of-a-kind ecosystem of leading startups, forward-thinking investors, enlightened enterprises, and creative testbeds – all working to bring groundbreaking AgeTech innovations to market.
“Now it has become the largest ecosystem in the world for AgeTech-oriented companies at almost 600 companies,” Miller said. “It includes some of the largest organizations, like the Fortune 10, all the way down to assisted living facilities. And it has the about 200 startups that have joined the collaborative and gone through our program.”
AARP has invested in about 57% of those over the last 3.5 years, or more than 100 investments now.
AARP’s foundation
AARP is the largest non-profit, non-partisan advocacy association in the U.S. Advocating for people over age 50 in the U.S., AARP has over 38 million members in the U.S.
AARP sees AgeTech as anything that will help people age well, and the company recognizes a huge need for people to use technology for care. Their mission is to empower people to choose how they live as they age by finding innovation, tech, and product solutions and services that help us all age well based on our own preferences.
AARP’s AgeTech Collaborative started in 2021 and is now the largest AgeTech ecosystem in the world, approaching 600 companies including some of the largest companies globally and over 90 venture capitalists. AARP has also had a huge presence at CES each year for its AgeTech solutions and collaborations.
Among AARP’s priorities for AgeTech solutions are the following:
- Smart home tech (77% of people want to age in their home an don’t want to go to assisted living, Miller said). These smart homes need a lot of sensors, like detecting whether someone has fallen in a home or is wandering off the property. This can also be targeted at smart home assisted living.
- Mobility + staying active. Providing exoskeletons to give people more strength in moving around has made strides in recent years, but the tech still is common to see being used.
- Brain health. The main fear people have as they age isn’t that they lose their car keys and their independence. With such prevalence of dementia, now the fear is they will lose their minds, Miller said.
- Social engagement + entertainment. Social isolation is a leading cause of loneliness among aging people, and there’s ways tech can be used to address this, such as using “music as medicine,” Miller said. Virtual reality travel and other applications hold promise in this area, he said.
The numbers around the aging population
Miller said that 12,000 people are turning age 65 every day in the U.S. And people ages 50+ contribute $8.3 trillion in economic impact in the U.S.
“When you live in India and China, Japan, the numbers even more staggering. And then when you think about the caregiving part of that, there’s just not enough of us to care for the people that are aging,” Miller said. “So technology is something we’re looking to to help fill that void. The AgeTech Investor Network is going to give angel investors access to a very unique deal flow pipeline.”
People 50 and older in the U.S. spent $77 billion on technology in 2022 — that number is projected to grow to roughly $120 billion in 2030, according to the AARP.
By 2030, the first millennials will turn age 50, elevating the age 50+ contribution to $12 trillion in economic impact in the U.S. (this would be 3rd largest GDP in world) and $35 trillion globally. By 2050, the age 50+ contribution is projected to be almost $100 trillion in economic impact globally.
“This is why we’ve had so many organizations join us in the collaborative,” Miller said. “If companies are not already selling to the 50-plus population, they have to do it because that’s where the money is gone. The big myth is that old people don’t use tech. The single largest cohort when it comes to consumer spend on technology is the 50 year olds to 60 year olds, which makes them the largest group of early adopters of tech.”
How the program works
One the valuable things that this network will create is curated deal flow pipeline.
“The interesting thing about the pipeline is that to work with AARP as a startup, you have to go to one of our events and make it to the stage. You don’t have to win, but you have to make it that far. And then we can pick and choose the ones that we want to invite into our accelerator program,” Miller said.
The accelerator program lasts eight weeks and that’s when AARP makes its decision about investing or not.
“We’re spending more time with a startup than probably any investor would ever spend before making a decision,” Miller said. “By the time that you make run the gauntlet, if you will, can you make it to the point where we would put you in front of an angel. We can’t ever completely de-risk any investment, but investors can have a really good feeling about how highly curated these companies are when they see them.”
In some cases, the startups will have pilot programs and commercial transactions that AARP helps facilitate.
“We’re building a double sided marketplace, and now we’re actively engaged with the angel community,” Miller said.
A partnership example
Trust & Will is the leading online estate planning company in the U.S. It is on a mission to ensure that every American leaves a lasting legacy. The firm is eliminating the painful process of going through probate court by focusing on digital estate planning that is comprehensive yet does not require an attorney.
Trust & Will has been involved with AARP through a partnership with the AgeTech Collaborative. In 2021, Trust & Will joined forces with AARP’s AgeTech Collaborative network in to help innovate for the 50+ community, collaborating with startups, investors, and industry leaders.
As AARP’s exclusive partner, Trust & WIll offers AARP members a 20% discount on estate planning services, making it easier for them to create wills and trusts. AARP also has a strategic investment in Trust & Will.
The AgeTech startups supported by AARP include VoiceIt, Lance, Kinoo, Joylux, Springrose, 1 True Health, 6Degrees, Dentity, DeepLook Medica, De Oro Devices, Abby by Gogotech, Addition, Advosense, Chas, Elektra Health, Ageless Innovation, Echas, Effectivte, Gameboard, Givers, GoodTrust, Grapefruit Health and SingFit.
At CES, AARP will have about 13,000 square feet of exhibit space at the Venetian, as part of the digital health, smart home and lifestyle technology areas. AARP is featuring 30 companies in the booth that span a variety of categories. AARP is doing the AgeTech Summit with the CTA, with Maria Shriver as a speaker. And on January 10, AARP will have a live-pitch event at the show for startups, with a cash prize.
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