Maya

Approximately 60% of the Bangladeshi population do not have access to basic healthcare according to a World Bank Institute report; care is often unaffordable, of low-quality, associated to stigma and inaccessible. Maya aims to address these issues by becoming everyone’s well-being assistant in Bangladesh and eventually across Asia, making access to healthcare affordable, high-quality, stigma-free and readily accessible through an anonymous AI-powered android mobile app. Through Maya, users can ask any health and well-being related questions anonymously and for free from anywhere in Bangladesh and get their answers from our network of registered and verified health experts. Users can also view questions and answers of other users on the app. For one tenth of the average consultation fee of a doctor a user can also get a phone consultation and prescription sent directly to them via the app. The app also allows users to upload pictures and reports to specialists.

Bangladesh ranked 133rd out of 195 countries in a recent health, access and quality index survey by The Gates Foundation. There are an estimated 3.05 physicians and 1.07 nurses per 10,000 people. With 70% of the 163 million population living in rural areas, only 25% of health workers serve those areas. Moreover, according to the World Health Organization, mental disorders affect 16.1% of adults and 18.4 % of children in Bangladesh. Over 6 million people experience depressive disorders and almost 7 million people have anxiety disorders. It is estimated that more than 10, 000 people die by suicide each year. 

While accessibility and quality of healthcare is already a cause for concern, it has financial and non-financial implications too. Apart from being expensive and concentrated in urban areas, the distance to healthcare centers, unavailability of legitimate doctors and nurses, the stigma associated with Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights and lack of agency of women are big factors affecting access to healthcare. Healthcare services available in urban areas are mostly provided through the private sector and is out of reach for the vast majority of the population due to the expense.

Maya is designed to improve the health and well-being of everyone, but especially young women aged 18 to 30 in both rural and urban settings. The app will help low-income users access basic healthcare information while urban well-to-do users will benefit more from the mental health services and sexual and reproductive health questions. Data is continuously collected to find out which type of questions users ask the most from the four broad categories available - physical health, mental health, lifestyle and social issues. Users are surveyed to identify satisfaction levels after their query is addressed. An eventual aim of the organization is to have a Research, Monitoring and Evaluation (RME) team to gather solid evidence of the behavioral change Maya is creating.   

Maya is a one-stop solution allowing users to access healthcare from anywhere by simply downloading the app and asking questions and getting expert advice. The anonymous feature allows users to ask questions without fear of stigma being attached. Women, especially in rural areas do not have the ability to take decisions on their own, which makes it difficult for them to go out and receive proper medical attention. Maya enables them to access healthcare at their own convenience. 

In order to solve the accessibility problem faced by a large segment of the population, the following services are being provided: 

Maya app: A free android mobile app that enables users to ask health and well-being-related questions and receive answers directly from experts. The user remains anonymous and can view questions and answers of other users.  

Maya Premium: A value-added service on top of the free Maya messaging based consultation. For this, we sell directly to consumers through the app/online and through a B2B channel i.e businesses enroll users.

E-commerce: Maya e-commerce primarily consists of the Maya Pharmacy which focuses on selling female hygiene products that are uncomfortable to buy from public stores such as sanitary napkins, contraceptives, etc. The users on the platform remain anonymous and the products are delivered in special packaging so that the products cannot be identified..

The two areas of technology that we are currently working with and constantly upgrading are Natural Language Processing (NLP) and AI. Bangla and Banglish (Bangla written in English) NLP is being refined by building a dictionary. We have 1M recorded consultations written in Bangla and Banglish.

Our automated response system can answer both physical and mental health questions from users by using our custom made machine learning model. It answers 30% of our total queries each day with 80% accuracy. The auto referral rate is 87% and the referrals are based on the question category. However, it must be noted that the queries will never be answered entirely by robots since some questions require human attention, especially mental health questions. 

 We have developed a chatbot using the dialogue flow platform, released in August 2018. It is trained with 200+ contents containing 70K+ training phrases. It is serving 200k+ users and receives 1M+ queries each month. Currently, it understands English, Banglish and Bangla. We are planning to add at least five more languages and launch in the UAE, India, Myanmar and Nepal within 2019. 

Our AI model accuracy is measured by 80% training and 20% testing data. For our machine learning model, the classification/decision threshold is set to 0.5. A value above that threshold indicates "correct"; a value below indicates "not correct". Accuracy is validated by our experts. All AI generated answers go into expert validation to make the automated response system more mature and accurate each day.

Key innovations include the following - 

• Global first “digital well-being assistant” for consumers looking for anonymous advice by simply messaging an expert from their phones

• The distributed, on-demand network of experts, who leverage an advanced Uber-like back end to respond to users, is also first of its kind

• There is some groundbreaking NLP tech behind this and our accuracy of automatically detecting the type of user query and understanding various factors of the user (e.g. urgency, complexity) is over 50%. This proprietary tech works across Bangla, English and “Banglish”

• We have already been using our algorithm for our SPAM filtering for some time now. Accuracy is over 95% for this. This system is also being tested to auto-respond to users in a natural and conversational manner, with high degrees of success

• We’ve also introduced innovative features in the Maya App front end. For instance, we are most likely the first app to experiment with Google’s “Text-to-Speech (TTS)” service for Bangla. Now every Maya app user can simply tap on the voice icon and hear the dialogue. Since launching this feature, we have seen 20% of app users try this feature out

• Our integrations with Facebook tools like Account Kit, FreeBasics, App Analytics have been called out by Facebook executives as best-in-class

The Maya Theory of Change is described below: 

Challenge: Difficult access to accurate and stigma-free health, mental health, lifestyle and legal advice and counselling hampers the well-being of girls, boys, women and men across Asia

Activities: 

1. Provide text  and video content on well-being issues (health, MH, lifestyle, legal aspects)

2. Provide anonymous, on-demand AI powered Q&A services

3. Provide online services such as prescriptions, e-commerce, doctors appointments, diagnostic/ health screening

Outputs: 

1.Instant “help” convenient, safe, private and meaningful is provided

2.People download the app or otherwise register on the Maya Apa platform

3.Users use Maya Apa regularly to  get credible, quality and timely information and/or counselling from professional experts

4.Users purchase the provided online services

Outcomes: 

1) Satisfaction: Users’ concerns are satisfactorily resolved

2) Knowledge: Users are more knowledgeable about provided topics

3) Attitude: Users feel more confident and secure and experience greater peace of mind, knowing they have a trusted information source and safe space to discuss issues, which keeps their identity confidential

4) Practice: Users make informed decisions related to their wellness or engage in appropriate behavior 

5) Practice: Users seek further care or help for related issues via external resources

Impact: Maya users (girls, boys, women and men across Asia) experience greater well-being and are empowered to deal with related issues.

1. 1 million users per month

2. 3.5 million users per month

3. 10 million users per month

By 2023 Maya expects to be fully operational and all services will be paid for by users of Maya. Maya’s revenue model will be based on a number of approaches. First, the business to business (B2B) model will expand to cover urban and rural garment factories, and then to banking and other sectors of the Bangladesh economy that employ low-income workers. Employers purchasing access for employees will be central to Maya’s revenue stream. Second, the direct to consumer (D2C) focus in the rural areas. Additionally, as Maya grows its user base the eCommerce and ePharmacy prescriptions approaches will yield higher returns.

The D2C channel will serve to greatly expand the user base, which will contribute to an increase of e-prescriptions. At present rural communities happen to be the most underserved population in Bangladesh, while also its largest (over 60%) and thus present the greatest opportunity for Maya to expand its market share to those most in need. Implementation of Doctor Marketplace can result in revenue sharing methods between Maya and doctors when users book and visit doctors from our app.

Maya is being developed in other languages apart from English and Bangla, for e.g. Arabic and Urdu and in a few years Maya is expected to be operational across Asia and beyond through expansion and whitelabelling.

Financial: Maya requires a continuous flow of funds in order to reach the numbers it has set to achieve in the next few years.

Technical: Bangladesh has a lack of qualified data scientists at the moment which hampers our efforts of hiring specialized individuals. With a smartphone penetration of just 16.1%, reaching people countrywide is difficult.

Legal: Telemedicine laws are still in a grey area at the moment which makes it difficult to implement innovative ideas freely in Bangladesh. 

Cultural: Asian culture is smeared with misconceptions and malpractices in healthcare, from practicing myth-based cures to quack village doctors. Moreover, the lack of agency of women prevent them from accessing healthcare on their own whenever they may be suffering. Women and young girls resort to advice from close family and friends which more often than not deprives them from the medical attention they actually require.

Market barriers: The greatest market barrier faced by Maya is the fact that it is hard to reach the target consumers who need Maya the most – low income groups in Bangladesh – mainly due to the lack of awareness of Maya’s existence. Trade regulations will make it even more difficult to reach low income groups in Asia in the next five years.

Financial: Maya is paving the path to a sustainable revenue source through its e-commerce, whitelabeling, tech-licensing, ad sales and partnerships which will support Maya operations in the long-run. In the short-run Maya is looking into grants and external funding to overcome financial barriers especially for its RME. Maya needs to invest in RME in order to fine-tune its services and create the greatest health impact among its beneficiaries.

Technical: While Bangladesh is yet to provide qualified data scientists, Maya will look into hiring specialized individuals from outside Bangladesh. Smartphone penetration is expected to increase over time and we are also partnering with mobile phone companies and operators in Bangladesh. As of 2018, there are 80.47 million mobile phone internet users in Bangladesh (BRTC) and unique mobile internet subscribers were at 35 million in 2017, according to GSMA which is a positive sign.

Legal: The apex court in Bangladesh has barred selling antibiotics without a prescription recently which shows the government's intent to improve the healthcare sector.

Cultural: With more and more women being educated and empowered every year, the Asian culture is shifting. In the coming years with more empowered women in the country we can drive behavior change through the Maya app. Women can avail healthcare in their convenience at their fingertips without relying on anyone.

Market barriers: With the global economy shifting more and more towards free trade, market barriers are expected to come down in the coming years.

Full-time: 27

Part-time: 3

Medical experts: 150

Ivy Huq Russel, CEO

Ivy is the CEO & founder of Maya. She completed her MSc. in Finance and Economics at Warwick Business School, before spending a number of years as an Investment Management & Hedge Fund professional at leading firms including HSBC, GAM and Barclays.

Rezwan Ahmed Noor, COO

Seasoned telecom network professional with comprehensive leadership, business & technical skill set and extensive expertise in service operation, systems integration, operational process improvement requirements analysis, workflow design, project management, process modeling, testing/quality assurance, estimating and vendor relationships.

Dr. Shayla Ahmed, CMO

Dr. Shayla joined Maya in 2016 as a senior medical expert. She has extensively worked on dispersing information related to SRHR issues. She has passed her MBBS from Armed Forces Medical College. After that completed her MPH from AIUB. 

Mahmud Jarman, CTO 

Mahmud Jarman has been working with Maya since 2016. He has received training from Google at the Google Launchpad Accelerator and Google Leadership Program in San Francisco in 2018. He is a passionate researcher in computer vision and AI. He is also considered as an expert in data analytics, user behavior, and user experience. 

Radh Ahmed, Senior Manager

Radh holds a diverse portfolio in the areas of Digital Marketing, Business Development, Project Management, and Consultancy. Radh graduated with distinction in Masters of  International Business Coventry University in the UK. 

Humayra Rahman Mitul, Senior Manager

Humayra has two years experience in Business Development in the non-profit sector of Bangladesh. She looks at projects and partnerships in Maya.

City Alo: City Alo, a dedicated women banking division of City Bank, has partnered with Maya whereby their customers receive special discounts from the Maya pharmacy. Both parties have also agreed to cross promotion. 

BRAC: BRAC, the largest NGO in the world, has a partnership with Maya through its Urban Development Program (UDP). Maya has placed kiosks in communities that UDP works in, especially in garments factories where the number of low-wage workers is very high.

ACI logistics: ACI logistics is one of Maya’s investors as well as promotion partner. Maya has customized cards for ACI logistics’ supermarket chain, Shwapno, which customers can purchase at the stores. The card features a subscription of Maya prescription services, discount from Maya pharmacy as well as at Shwapno. 

Change Associates: Change Associates, a non-profit that works with garment industries, helps us get access to workers in garments. 

Yellow Brick Road (YBR): YBR empowers people in industrial and educational institutions with life skills education to deal with challenges faced in their institutions. YBR provides training through fun interactive sessions to build their knowledge and develop positive practices on issues that are crucial for overall development. Maya has a knowledge sharing partnership with YBR.

Over the past couple of years, Maya has begun to test different approaches to expand health and well-being information to low and medium-income populations across Bangladesh while simultaneously testing sustainable revenue streams.

Maya operates the following revenue generating products and services:

1. Maya Premium - A value-added service in addition to the free Maya messaging based consultation. For this, we sell directly to consumers through the app/ online and through a B2B channel i.e. businesses enroll users

2. Services - Offered to businesses ranging from technology licensing e.g. (dialog deal and marketing and advertising services)

3. Telecommunications (Telco)/ Value-added Service - Maya’s value-added service of daily health tips and mini subscription packages are currently operational at two of the top Telcos of the country. This service is also available overseas through Telcos in Nepal and Sri Lanka.

4. E-commerce: Maya serves the community by selling discrete items for health, hygiene and personal care through its e-commerce platform. Our goal is to allow people to purchase items with ease and comfort. We intend to drive our sales through behavioral changes according to our suggestions provided in the answers to users query.

Recent partnerships were established with BRAC and Facebook to test expansion of awareness and access to Maya, alongside new revenue streams.

Maya is currently funding its work through a combination of donations and grants, selling products and services and raising capital investment. Donations and grants are primarily required now because Maya’s main service of answering queries is still being provided free. Maya hopes to gain traction in its revenue stream through its e-commerce, premium packages, ad sales and various partnerships in the long-run.  

Among the barriers mentioned above, the Tiger IT Foundation can help Maya most to overcome the financial, technical and monitoring and evaluation barriers. 

In terms of overcoming the financial barriers, Maya wants expert advice from Tiger IT Foundation to help optimise its current revenue sources and explore other revenue streams.

Maya also needs international expertise for data science which the Tiger IT Foundation can assist with to overcome technical barriers.

We already have data showing users are satisfied with Maya’s services, however, to show health impact, we need to roll out our RME plan on a large-scale. Maya can use the prize money to use its wealth of data and implement its RME plan to show the behavioral change it has brought about in its users.

Healthcare organizations: We would like to learn more from organizations who are working to improve healthcare in Bangladesh and Asia and partner with them to improve our work. 

Women-centric organizations: Since Maya wants to help women access the healthcare they need, organizations working with women can help Maya reach more women.

Tech/IT organizations: At Maya we are constantly working to improve our app and user experience, in that light we want to partner with tech organizations that will help Maya to run more smoothly and yield better impact.

MNCs/foreign organizations: Maya wants to expand beyond Bangladesh and will have to partner with organizations based in foreign countries or MNCs which are based in multiple locations.