Collective Health is headquartered in San Francisco and has raised $230 million in venture capital from investors like NEA, Founders Fund, GV, and Sun Life. Five years ago, they embarked on a journey to become "the first integrated solution that allows self-funded employers to administer plans, control costs, and take care of their people — all in one place." Today, they announce big expansion news: Collective Health is coming to Silicon Slopes, planning to open a Salt Lake City office in early 2019. Scott Murray, SVP of Operations and the man who led eBay's Utah expansion in 2013, will be tasked with doing the same for Collective Health in a move they anticipate will create hundreds of jobs in Utah.
I caught up with Murray to get the lowdown on the move.
Q: The obvious expansion question: why Utah?
A: The decision on Utah was made before I joined, but I know that Collective Health is thoughtful about where it does business. We’re headquartered in San Francisco and have an engineering hub in Chicago, so there’s a clear pattern of identifying where innovation is happening, where we can attract the right talent, and where communities and businesses are thriving and supporting each other.
Utah is continuously ranked as one of the best states for businesses and there’s a strong support system between businesses, the government, and local communities. I’m excited to help open our operation here to support our fast growing membership. We anticipate bringing hundreds of new jobs to the area in the next few years.
Q: What did you learn during the process of leading eBay's expansion in Utah that will be valuable as you do the same with Collective Health?
At eBay, I co-led a major effort to transform how we approached customer service, including using technology in new ways. Those changes, many driven by the team in Draper, helped the company operate at scale (about 350 million customer interactions annually) while improving the experience for customers in a meaningful way. Collective Health is at an exciting phase of its growth, and I’ll bring that experience to bear to help the team scale quickly while maintaining trust with our members.
As we get settled, I’ll also have the opportunity to put my knowledge of this community to work. While at eBay, I got to know Salt Lake City as a thriving and passionate community. It has a fantastic talent pool, excellent universities, and a vibrant local scene — but there’s also an energy and natural beauty here that is unmatched.
Q: For those who may be unfamiliar, is there anything you'd like Utahns to know about Collective Health as they join this community?
Collective Health is one of the most promising and fast-growing companies in the health tech sector with $230M in venture capital funding. Most importantly, our mission is clear, and I think most people can relate to it — we want to make it effortless to navigate, understand, and pay for healthcare.
One of the reasons I’m thrilled to join Collective Health is that a customer-centric mindset is baked into the company’s DNA. Ali Diab, our CEO, founded the company in response to a rough healthcare experience following a pretty serious medical incident. So the member experience is front-and-center and unlike anything most people have experienced with their health benefits — we have the industry’s highest Net Promoter Score (70+).
We also work with some of the country’s best and most forward-thinking employers including Pinterest, Uber, Activision Blizzard, and many others to deliver better healthcare benefits more efficiently and cost effectively. Heading into 2019, we’ll be serving more than 200,000 members in all 50 states.
We are thrilled to come to Utah not only to set up a major operations hub, but also to lay down roots in a great community. We want to build our team here with smart, passionate, empathetic people who want to be a part of transforming healthcare, because they share our belief that people deserve a better healthcare experience.
