Milton Chen Vsee

These are highlights from Health 2.0 Asia keynote speech delivered by Dr. Milton Chen, CEO of VSee – the telehealth system used by companies such as Walgreens, Shell, and NASA on the International Space Station. This conference was held in Shibuya Hikarie, Japan on December 5-6, 2017. Health 2.0 is What’s Missing from Telehealth? Milton Chen Co-founder & CEO - VSee, This American Doc Milton is a co-founder and CEO of VSee – the only approved video telehealth platform used by NASA astronauts aboard the International Space Station. He did his PhD at Stanford University where he researched human factors and design of video collaboration.

Milton Chen is the founder and CEO of VSee and This American Doc, the only video telehealth software good enough for the NASA International Space Station, how astronauts see their doctors every day. VSee supports 1500+ customers including all three of the biggest healthcare systems in the USA: HCA, Trinity, Ascension. Telehealth Secrets Conference 2018 by VSee To get full access to VSee telehealth conference recordings, please visit: vsee.com/conferenceSubscibe to VSee You.

NSF News 09-017

New system enabled law enforcement to monitor security cameras all at once, even from police cruisers

Colleen Beeson of VSee holds the hardware component of their virtual office system.

February 4, 2009

View videos of Milton Chen, chief technology officer at VSee, and Errol Arkilic, program manager in NSF's Division of Industrial Innovation and Partnerships.

This material is available primarily for archival purposes. Telephone numbers or other contact information may be out of date; please see current contact information at media contacts.

One of the toughest technological challenges for law enforcement is to simultaneously monitor live feeds from the wireless cameras scattered across their jurisdictions. A nearly impossible task under any circumstances, it was an even greater one for Barack Obama's Presidential Inauguration.

In planning to safeguard the millions of visitors and residents in the city for the Inauguration events, Washington, D.C. required a new surveillance approach.

In response, law enforcement adapted a 'virtual office' system called VSee to overcome the bandwidth obstacles that had prevented simultaneous access to all of the city's cameras.

Developed with National Science Foundation (NSF) support as part of the Small Business Innovation Research Program, VSee is a combination of hardware and software that allows users to securely receive and share large amounts of information, usually within a virtual office environment.

Though originally created as a telework platform, VSee was adapted to enable security officers to watch multiple remote cameras in real time from a single command center. Because the changes to the system shrank the cameras' says Chen.

Not satisfied with existing virtual office approaches, Chen wanted to find a way to capture the advantages of telework without the usual technical shortfalls and impact on office social dynamics--both burdens on productivity. Even today, with the support of funds from NSF and other sources, Chen and his team modify the software based on findings from research studies of the social dynamics of both the workplace and home work environments.

Existing collaboration tools limited the remote work experience in significant ways, with handicaps including difficulties sharing on-screen applications, limited webcam feeds and poor video, which can cloud the critical social cues necessary for remote communication.

'From a technology standpoint, what resonated most with NSF was the clever bandwidth-management enabled by VSee's approach,' says Errol Arkilic, the NSF program officer who oversees VSee's grants. It was the bandwidth management that made the Inauguration monitoring possible. 'VSee engineered a solution that bypasses the constraints of various communications protocols, a breakthrough that has the potential to span across many platforms, including wireless.'

Within the remote-work system that Chen and his collaborators developed, all users can clearly see each other at once, work together on an on-screen document or other object, and trust that their environment is secure from intruders. And unlike a virtual meeting, the VSee platform is on all day, with options for privacy, so it becomes a true virtual office environment.

For the Inauguration application, the interface was the same, with each camera taking the role of a 'user'. With VSee managing the bandwidth, for the first time, security officials could keep all cameras active and bring real-time situational awareness to law enforcement officers wherever they were in the city.

VSee also solved the key problem of inter-agency collaboration. During the Inauguration, VSee was used by half a dozen law enforcement agencies to share information and collaborate in real-time.

While security applications are still new, the system's adoption for telework has expanded rapidly since its release in 2003, with several Fortune 500 companies and federal agencies adopting VSee for remote work or for traceless, secure collaborations.

The employees at VSee are continuing to refine their software, modifying it as they use it for their internal use in offices around the world. Says Chen,'By focusing on the collaboration requirements of a team like ours, we aim to create a simple tool to achieve the productivity of a bullpen in a tech startup.'

-NSF-

View Video
Milton Chen of VSee explains how the system works and how it differs from existing applications.
Credit and Larger Version
View Video
Errol Arkilic describes the VSee technology and role of federal investments for small-business R&D.
Credit and Larger Version
The employees at VSee use the application for their own multi-national telework environment.
Credit and Larger Version
The VSee hardware is shown as it appears installed within a security system.
Credit and Larger Version

Media Contacts
Joshua A. Chamot, NSF, (703) 292-7730, email: jchamot@nsf.gov

Program Contacts
Errol B. Arkilic, NSF, (703) 292-8095, email: earkilic@nsf.gov

Principal Investigators
Milton Chen, VSee, (650) 400-1798, email: milton@vsee.com

The U.S. National Science Foundation propels the nation forward by advancing fundamental research in all fields of science and engineering. NSF supports research and people by providing facilities, instruments and funding to support their ingenuity and sustain the U.S. as a global leader in research and innovation. With a fiscal year 2021 budget of $8.5 billion, NSF funds reach all 50 states through grants to nearly 2,000 colleges, universities and institutions. Each year, NSF receives more than 40,000 competitive proposals and makes about 11,000 new awards. Those awards include support for cooperative research with industry, Arctic and Antarctic research and operations, and U.S. participation in international scientific efforts.

Connect with us online
NSF website: nsf.gov
NSF News: nsf.gov/news
For News Media: nsf.gov/news/newsroom
Statistics: nsf.gov/statistics/
Awards database: nsf.gov/awardsearch/

Follow us on social
Twitter: twitter.com/NSF and twitter.com/NSFspox
Facebook: facebook.com/US.NSF
Instagram: instagram.com/nsfgov

View Video
Milton Chen of VSee explains how the system works and how it differs from existing applications.
Credit and Larger Version
View Video
Errol Arkilic describes the VSee technology and role of federal investments for small-business R&D.
Credit and Larger Version
The employees at VSee use the application for their own multi-national telework environment.
Credit and Larger Version
The VSee hardware is shown as it appears installed within a security system.
Credit and Larger Version

In Episode #611, Nathan interviews Dr. Milton Chen. He’s the co-founder and CEO of VSee, and has a PhD from Stanford on the design of video collaboration. Additionally, he was the co-founder of XMPP Video Standard which is now used by Google Talk and Facebook Chat. He has deployed VSee for Hillary Clinton, Angelina Jolie, Linkin Park and UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon.

Subscribe to show on iTunes:

Subscribe to show on Google Play:

iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Soundcloud, How to Subscribe

How Does Vsee Work

Famous Five:

Favorite Book? – Zero to One
What CEO do you follow? – Marc Benioff
Favorite online tool? — Rapportive
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Milton would tell himself not to be as naïve and clueless

Time Stamped Show Notes:

01:40 – Nathan introduces Milton to the show
02:20 – Vsee is a SaaS company
- 02:31 – Vsee offers mobile app and call center workflow
03:04 – Price range is $49-499 per medical provider per month
03:30 – Milton explains how VSee provides a service to client, Trinity Health
04:30 – Milton assures their client security and confidentiality
05:05 – Vsee was launched in 2008
05:33 – Milton went to graduate school because he wanted to become a professor
05:46 – Milton now loves everything about startups
06:03 – Vsee’s initial investment
- 06:24 – It was an equity investment
06:42 – Milton was clueless about valuations and didn’t know what he was doing
- 06:59 – Milton started VSee after graduate school with zero knowledge about business
07:15 – Milton was just grateful that people wanted to invest in VSee
07:35 – Vsee currently had a thousand paying customers
09:00 – Average number of nurses in VSee
09:23 – First year revenue
10:11 – Average amount raised
10:40 – Team size is 52 and they are based in Sunnyvale, CA
12:12 – VSee is currently cash flow mutual
12:51 – Vsee invests in making sure their customers feel secure
13:18 – Milton shares how their technology is built into Facebook Messenger
14:00 – Milton doesn’t get royalties
14:40 – Vsee started as a general video conference market
14:50 – Milton shares how they pivoted to the health industry
15:34 – Vsee has an inside sales team
- 15:41 – Vsee has 3 sources for sales
16:22 – Vsee is currently not into paid marketing
17:40 – Vsee has close to 100% customer retention
18:17 – Vsee is on a net negative churn
19:20 – 2017 revenue target
20:56 – Vsee’s last closed round was in 2011
21:10 – Milton is just focused on acquiring more customers and is not interested in any acquisition talks
22:47 – The Famous Five

3 Key Points:

Everyone has to start somewhere – even if it means being naïve and clueless.
Getting into a market with less competition could mean more customers and sales.
Paid marketing won’t always work so test everything, first, before investing in a certain marketing strategy.

Resources Mentioned:

Vee See Messenger

Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
Host Gator– The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible.
Audible– Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books.
The Top Inbox – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences

Vsee Contact Phone Number

Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives