UpLift, a behavioral health company, announced Monday that it has acquired TAO Connect, a mental health company for higher education organizations.
Based in Tampa, Florida UpLift offers virtual access to talk therapy, psychiatry and medication management services. It has a national network of nearly 2,000 providers and accepts insurance, including from Aetna, Cigna and UnitedHealthcare. Based in Clearwater, Florida TAO Connect provides higher education institutions with online interactive programs and tools designed to address mental health. It offers modules on a variety of topics, including how to manage your first year at college, how to improve focus, and preventing sexual assault.
UpLift’s acquisition of TAO Connect was a combination of cash and stock, but the companies did not share the purchase price. Companies are now launching TAO from UpLift, which gives institutions “access to a comprehensive tertiary mental health solution and continuum of care designed to complement institutional counseling services, all covered by insurance,” according to the release.
With the acquisition, UpLift now serves over 170 enterprise customers in the US and Canada. It covers four million people, including more than two million students in more than 120 higher education institutions.
“Lack of access to affordable behavioral health care is a key driver of America’s mental health crisis, and our students are struggling—increasingly anxious, depressed, and struggling with loneliness while facing the pressures of academia,” said Kyle Talcott, founder and CEO of UpLift, in an email. “TAO is already in place, a 10-year-old, tried and proven higher education company with a clinically validated mental health solution, providing self-directed tools and resources for students that complement the counseling services offered by institutions. “
When asked how TAO Connect will fit into UpLift’s operations, Talcott said the company “thinks of it as business as usual as we continue the great momentum that the TAO team has in serving TAO’s customers in higher education.” He added that UpLift has retained most of the TAO team.
“We have plans for both near- and long-term product integration — for example, creating synergies through seamless student referrals and care escalation processes — that our product and engineering teams are encompassing,” Talcott said. “We are, of course, beginning to offer UpLift’s clinical services to institutions of higher education.”
The acquisition comes at a time when 77 percent of college students struggle with mental health problems and 53 percent are unable to get care, according to American College Health Association. In addition, a recent research looked at reasons why students don’t seek care and found that 51% thought it was too expensive, 27% said wait times were too long, and 27% said they couldn’t find care.
Dr. Sherry Benton, founder of TAO Connect, said the company has common goals with UpLift and the acquisition helps achieve those goals.
“Like UpLift, TAO Connect was conceived to meet the growing demand for more affordable and better mental health treatment options and solutions, including telehealth,” Benton said in an email. “As part of UpLift, we can now be more effective in serving unmet needs in the higher education market, providing a continuum of mental health care that includes team therapy and psychiatry.”
UpLift’s acquisition of TAO Connect follows the company acquired Set in November. Minded is an online provider of psychiatry focused on women. In July and UpLift announced it raised $10.7 million in Series A funding, bringing its total funding to more than $22 million.
Other companies also provide mental health care to students, including TimelyCare and Mild behavioral health.
Photo: Bogdan Skripnik, Getty Images
