Chia-Lin Simmons, CEO of LogicMark, was recently interviewed by Benzinga.
LogicMark is a cutting-edge provider of personal emergency response systems (PERS), health communications devices and IoT technologies. CEO Chia-Lin Simmons spoke about the company and its growth strategies aimed at increasing shareholder value. She discussed her efforts to turn the company around, shifting from a one-time purchase hardware model to a SAAS and recurring revenue model. Additionally, she talked about LogicMark's expansion into personal safety, not just for aging adults but for all.
LogicMark is a cutting-edge provider of personal emergency response systems (PERS), health communications devices and IoT technologies. CEO Chia-Lin Simmons spoke about the company and its growth strategies aimed at increasing shareholder value. She discussed her efforts to turn the company around, shifting from a one-time purchase hardware model to a SAAS and recurring revenue model. Additionally, she talked about LogicMark's expansion into personal safety, not just for aging adults but for all.
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NewsTranscript
00:00Welcome back, traders and investors here at Benzinga.
00:05We like to bring you guys exciting companies, and that is exactly what we have today.
00:09We are speaking to Logic Mark, trading on the NASDAQ under ticker LGMK.
00:14I'm joined by CEO Shailen Simmons.
00:17Shailen, how are you doing today?
00:19Doing great. Thank you so much for the invite, Aaron.
00:21Of course. Thank you for joining me today.
00:23So before we hop into the specifics, why don't you just give us a quick overview of Logic Mark?
00:29Sure. Logic Mark is on the NASDAQ LGMK, as mentioned.
00:35We have been around since 2006 and have been on the NASDAQ, I believe, since 2016.
00:41We are providers of what I think in the past people call sort of the old school medical alerts.
00:47I can't get up products.
00:50We are actually in the business to revolutionize that category of business, as well as extend our business into what is called a personal safety category,
00:58which means personal safety for everyone, not just people who are aging.
01:04Got it. Then Shailen, you started as a B2G hardware company and have transitioned into the consumer market and expanded into a SaaS model.
01:12Why? What has that transition been like?
01:15Yeah, so I joined the company in June of 2021.
01:20We have been only a hardware company, which means as a company, we have actually been doing fantastic.
01:26We have a 60 percent margin. We have subsequently increased that margin to from 60 to 67 percent, a very good increase.
01:34But the reality is, is that, you know, that the world that we live in today, almost every appliance in our home is connected.
01:42And so we don't think that a product as personal and as, you know, important as a medical alert product or PERS units,
01:51as we call them, personal emergency response system should be unconnected as well.
01:56And so what we have sort of moved forward with was actually provide a suite of technology that actually goes with new hardware that includes,
02:06you know, 24-7 monitoring service that's U.S. based, that includes actually enhanced fall detection products.
02:15We also have things like geofencing, which is for folks who have memory care or Alzheimer's to actually help their family members ensure that they are where they need to be.
02:26And so because our products now are connected, they also give us the opportunity to actually also launch new products as well and services on top of that.
02:38And so by bringing these SAS and recurring subscription products, it allows us to basically provide more products and more services to a base of customers that actually expect them.
02:48You know, 10,000 people are turning 65 and over every day.
02:53One in four of them will fall. The Boomer generation, they really are expecting a better product than a previous generation.
03:01And so that's what we aim to provide them, basically a suite of product that's not just hardware, but also services that they have come to expect from connected devices in the world.
03:13And then Shailen, what makes this new focus unique? What are your differentiators?
03:18Yeah, that's a really great question. Thank you so much for asking that.
03:22You know, we really feel that for a lot of businesses in this category space, they tend to be in packagers,
03:29which means that they buy technology from different sort of places.
03:33They don't actually develop the technology. They tend to have services that are monitoring services only.
03:41We are a technology company. And what I mean by that, we're one of the few in this particular category space that's actually inventing new technology, developing new IP, optimizing things.
03:54And so, for example, when we talk about fall detection, typically medical alert products have accelerometers.
04:02And so they are categorizing speed. And so they put their algorithms and AI algorithms or whatever algorithms, machine learning algorithms utilizing one sensor, which is accelerometer.
04:13So for our products, you know, we're looking to do better.
04:16I'm a geek enough to say that we really feel like better technology and better identification of a fall versus not a fall will help people want to wear these products more, less false positives.
04:26And so we've actually developed better technology around using more sensors to identify what is a fall.
04:33We are unique in a sense that we actually have developed software that allows family members to coordinate care as well.
04:40So, you know, maybe I'm on call for a parent from 8 to 10 o'clock, but I have a meeting at 11. So my brother takes over, for example, that type of technology doesn't really exist bundled with, you know, PERS devices today.
04:53And so we actually provide that type of technology. So we're always constantly looking at being what we would call human centric, which means we're putting people in the center of the technology that we're doing.
05:03We're not asking people to adapt to our technology, but rather we're trying to build technology that meets people where they are and where they need to be and how they interact with each other in the world.
05:14And so in the time that we've been here since June of 2021, we've actually filed 14 plus patents.
05:21You know, seven of them have been published. We've actually received a couple already.
05:25And so that's very aggressive, even for a technology venture backed startup, much less a small micro cap company on the NASDAQ.
05:33And so when people are looking at this company, they should be thinking, have to develop great patents that's defensible against competitors.
05:40Are they developing great technology that's going to meet the needs of the consumer?
05:44And I think that's really what makes us unique, that we are a technology for a company. We're human centric. We put our customers in a center.
05:51We're not trying to make them use our products and change their behavior.
05:56And we're really trying to provide a suite of technology that will continue to sort of grow.
06:02Not just be a reactive technology and get you help when you need it. Absolutely basic table stakes.
06:08We think everybody should be doing that and doing that better. And we're aiming to do that with our technology and patents,
06:13but also being able to try to get at being predictive, which means that can we see if based on your patterns that you're more likely for a fall?
06:21That's when a company like ours are much more groundbreaking.
06:27We're not reacting to things. We're actually trying to predict things.
06:31Thank you, Shailen, for providing some more color there. What does Logic Marks plan for increasing top line revenue? What about margins?
06:39Yes. So, Aaron, we spoke very briefly about margin. And so we've actually done a good job in terms of increasing the hardware margin to date.
06:47So, you know, we have been floating around 60 percent.
06:50We've increased those to 67 and we'll continue to sort of work on our hardware margins.
06:55But what's exciting for us around margins is that we're now providing subscription and SaaS services.
07:02And so those are higher margin products in the 70s, 80s and beyond.
07:08And so what you're looking at for us as a company in terms of us being transformative now is that instead of just having one margin,
07:16which is around hardware, taking us from 60 to 67 percent, we are now also increasing our mixed margin because we're providing SaaS and software services and recurring subscription services that are in the 70 percent and higher opportunities.
07:31And so what, you know, investors and folks who like the company will see is that we will actually have increased mixed margins on a forward looking basis.
07:41Now, on a top line revenue side, we have and continue to be very bullish about our B2G, the business to government sector.
07:52And so we think that there's a lot of additional opportunities here for us to grow.
07:57And so you'll see us growing top line on the B2G side consistently because, again, we work with the VA.
08:03It's the largest hospital network in the United States.
08:06However, there are additional sort of government opportunities, both sort of on a federal side as well as in states and municipalities that we really feel like we are excited to tap into even more.
08:20So we all see top line from that particular perspective.
08:23But we're also very bullish on our direct to consumer side of the business.
08:27We have only really just launched for the company's history, a new direct to consumer business.
08:32You'll see us actively trying to increase our subscription and consumer direct opportunities via our own website, as well as optimize our Amazon presence and experience there.
08:44And finally, you know, I'm a big believer in the B2B business sector.
08:49We have actually in the past only very slightly focused on the resale distribution and the partnership opportunities.
08:57And so you'll see us basically start ramping up because we have these recurring subscriptions and larger margin products to look at additional partnerships and revenue opportunities from a B2B perspective so that we can actually tap into similar audiences across the board.
09:14And so I'm very excited about that.
09:17And most importantly, you know, we're launching new products.
09:20I mean, we have been a medical alerts company, PERS unit company, but we've increased our TAM and our audience by just even introducing a new product called Aster, which is personal safety for everyone.
09:32And so you should expect to see top line revenue growth from that new sort of opening of category as well.
09:39Beautiful. And then Shailen, are you interested in using AI or machine learning in your products?
09:45If so, how?
09:46Yeah, so great question.
09:49You know, it's such a buzzword right now to talk about AI and ML.
09:53And so we absolutely are using AI and ML within our sort of technology sector.
10:00You noted that I might have sort of touched very briefly on being a predictive technology company.
10:05And so we've already filed multiple patents in the AI and ML space.
10:10And so what we're really looking at is applying that technology to really predict likelihood of falls and incidences.
10:18And so, again, we don't want to just be really great at, you know, getting you the help that you need, because we think that that's just basic table stakes.
10:26And we should be faster and better at sensing and getting rid of false positives, which we also use AI and ML for better calibration of fall detections is one side of the sort of reactive technology usage.
10:39But the exciting piece is also the application of AI and ML into predictive analytics, which means that as we're building your digital twin within our cloud, we're utilizing AI and ML to basically say, hey, Shailen, if you're a 65 year old woman with diabetes and low blood pressure, you know, when we see that, you know, you exhibiting these types of patterns, we see people with a similar sort of scope on an anonymous aggregate sort of perspective with similar sort of capabilities.
11:09You know, situation three to six months later, they had a fall.
11:13So why don't we sort of share that data with you?
11:16Because our, you know, AI and ML is looking at, you know, all of that data and making sort of analytics and predictions out of that.
11:25So, well, Shailen, it's been great to learn more about LogicMark again.
11:30We've been on the line with CEO Shailen Simmons.
11:34Thank you for joining us at Benzinga today.
11:36Again, LogicMark trading on the NASDAQ under ticker LGMK.
11:40Shailen, thank you again.
11:42Thank you for inviting us.