Investment in a Company Developing and Operating a Home-visit Nursing Administrative and Operational Support System

Sumitomo Corporation (Head Office: Chuo-ku, Tokyo; President & CEO: Kuniharu Nakamura) has agreed to accept a private equity placement from eWeLL Co., Ltd. (Head Office: Osaka-shi, Osaka; President: Norito Nakano), a company developing and operating the iBow administrative and operational support system for home-visit nursing-care providers, investing a total of 200 million yen in the company.  
 
The elderly population aged 65 and over in Japan is expected to increase from 33.95 million (26.8% of the total population) in 2015 to 36.57 million by 2025, thus exceeding 30% of the total population. As the aging of society progresses, it is forecast that medical and nursing-care expenses will swell from 52 trillion yen in 2015 to 80 trillion yen by 2025. With this situation as a backdrop, the Japanese government is promoting the use of home medical and nursing care services, and the importance and need for home-visit nursing is expected to rise even more. However, the work environment for home-visit nurses is challenging due to a manpower shortage and inefficient administrative practices where many service providers still rely on hand-writing to produce large quantities of documents, including those for patient information management. The iBow, offered by eWeLL, is a cloud service that enables administrative and operational work associated with home-visit nursing to be performed on a PC and tablet and, through this shift from analog to digital, realizes reduced administrative workload and higher operational efficiency of nurses.  
 
eWeLL will utilize the increased capital to develop new functions of the iBow and reinforce the company’s sales and marketing with a view to further expanding its customer base. By supporting the further popularization and expansion of the iBow to help solve problems faced by home-visit nursing-care providers, Sumitomo Corporation will contribute to promoting the use of home medical and nursing care services. Sumitomo Corporation will also cooperate with TOMOD’S INC., a subsidiary operating a chain of drugstores with a prescription department, as well as with other subsidiaries, to expand its health care and home medical and nursing care businesses.