Ah, November, that special time of year when Americans get to re-enroll for health insurance and find out whether their costs will go up “just” 5% or whether they face a double-digit increase for the year to come.

    This year technology’s potential role in controlling seemingly unjustifiable increases is getting more attention than ever—in part because of wildly optimistic expectations surrounding consumer gadgets such as fitness bracelets. By June, funding for digital healthcare technology companies reached $2.3 billion—surpassing the previous year’s total, according to Rock Health, a startup incubator.

    Two illustrative examples from this month alone: Xerox’s unprecedented investment in telemedicine company HealthSpot, which plans to install its kiosks not just at medical facilities but also at big companies; and pharmaceutical giant Novartis AG’s growing interest in wearable technologies that can track the effectiveness of its drugs.

    Another indicator is the customer traction being reported this autumn by Castlight Health, which made its rather controversial I.P.O. in March. (The company debuted with a market cap of almost $3 billion, but its value currently stands around $1.01 billion.)

    Every year, U.S. employers spend a whopping $620 billion on healthcare benefits with very little visibility into where that money goes. Castlight puts those costs under the microscope for at least 40 Fortune 500 companies including Google, Kraft Foods Group, Microsoft, and Wal-Mart.

    Its service, called Enterprise Health Cloud, shows the prices a company’s employees pay for everything from cholesterol tests to magnetic resonance imaging, or MRI, scans to wellness visits to their doctor. The vision is to help employers better understand these cost and to let employees make more informed decisions about what they can expect to pay and about the quality of care they will receive.

    “They have a cockpit where they get a ton of analytics about where the money is spent,” said Castlight CEO and co-founder Giovanni “Gio” Colella, whose previous company, RelayHealth, was acquired by McKesson in 2006. Collela’s co-founders were Todd Park (co-founder of Athenahealth and the tech guru who helped fix the troubled Healthcare.gov site) and venture capitalist Bryan Roberts (Venrock).

    One Castlight customer, for example, discovered an unusually high incidence of back pain issues within certain departments. The company came up with an ergonomic solution to this problem, paring back on those medical costs, Colella said.

    How did Castlight convince almost every insurance company (except United Healthcare because of an exclusivity clause) to disclose this information? By convincing businesses to demand the information. Right now, the service covers most medical procedures and pharmacy information. Offerings that cover dental plans and behavioral health are in the wings.

    Castlight boasted 159 customers at the end of the third quarter. According to its latest earnings report, the company expects to generate $43.9 million to $44.3 million this year, with anticipated losses of $74 million to $75 million. (Its CEO and CFO are scheduled to present updates at two investor conferences later this week.)

    对于美国人来说，11月是个特殊的月份，因为他们要在这个月重新登记参加医疗保险，并且他们将算清楚来年的医保费用是“仅仅”增加5%，还是增加两位数。

    今年，在控制这种看上去不合理的医保费用上涨方面，科技的潜在作用得到了更多人关注——这在很大程度上是由于人们对运动手环等消费类电子产品的乐观期望。据创业孵化器Rock Health统计，截至今年6月，数字医疗科技类公司的融资总额已达到23亿美元——超过了去年的总额。

    仅本月就有两个明显的例子：施乐（Xerox）史无前例地投资远程医疗公司HealthSpot，后者计划将其远端临场医疗设施安装到医疗机构和大公司内；制药业巨头诺华制药公司（Novartis）对能够跟踪药效的可穿戴技术表现出日益浓厚的兴趣。

    数字医疗成为热门的另外一个迹象，是移动医疗公司Castlight Health在今年秋天公布的客户吸引力。该公司在3月进行了颇具争议的IPO。（公司最初上市时的市值约为30亿美元，但其现在的市值却一直维持在10.1亿美元。）

    美国雇主每年的医疗福利支出达到惊人的6,200亿美元，但他们却很难跟踪这笔钱的去向。而Castlight则可以将这笔支出摸得一清二楚，供至少40家《财富》美国500强公司了解其流向，这些公司包括谷歌（Google）、卡夫食品集团（Kraft Foods Group）、微软（Microsoft）和沃尔玛（Wal-Mart）。

    这项企业医疗保健云服务，将显示出公司员工的医疗支出，包括胆固醇测定、磁共振成像（MRI）扫描以及健康体检等多个项目。这些数据不仅可以帮助雇主更有效地了解医疗福利费用，也可以让员工对他们想要付费的项目和可以获得的保健质量做出更明智的决定。

    Castlight Health公司的CEO兼联合创始人乔瓦尼•“吉奥”•科莱拉表示：“他们有一个系统，其中包括对医疗福利费用的大量分析。”科莱拉之前的公司RelayHealth在2006年被麦克森公司（McKesson）收购。科莱拉的联合创始人包括托德•帕克（电子病历管理公司Athenahealth的联合创始人，同时也是一位技术专家，曾帮助解决美国医保网站Healthcare.gov的故障）和风险投资人布莱恩•罗伯茨（风投公司Venrock）。

    例如，Castlight的一位客户发现某个部门内背部疼痛的发病率之高，有些异常。于是，该公司针对这一问题提出了一项人体工学解决方案，削减了这部分医疗费用，科莱拉说道。

    那么，Castlight是如何说服几乎所有的保险公司披露这些信息的呢[只有联合健康保险公司（United Healthcare）因排他性条款未披露相关信息]？通过说服客户索要这些信息。目前，该服务涵盖了多数医疗程序和药物信息。公司即将推出包括牙科保健计划和行为健康的服务。

    Castlight宣称截至第三季度末共有159家客户。其最近公开的收益报告显示，公司今年的预期收益为4,390万美元至4,430万美元，预期损失7,400万美元至7,500万美元。（公司CEO和CFO计划在本周晚些时候召开两次投资者会议，公布最新财务数据。）

    Christopher Lochhead, partner with consulting firm Play Bigger and advisor to Castlight’s management team, says healthcare costs are among the top three to five costs for most big businesses. The rise of powerful analytics technologies along with the transparency demanded by social media are driving interest in Castlight’s services. “This is a company, as corny as it may sound, that could do very well by doing a lot of good,” Lochhead said.

    Healthcare provider are also hungry for data that can help them make more informed decisions on behalf of their patients, said Mike Harden, co-founder and senior partner at ARTIS Ventures. This observation comes while during our chat last week about the role of wearable technologies in corporate wellness initiatives. “In order for make that information of value, it needs to connect to a professional,” he said. “It needs to connect to something that your nutritionist or doctor might be able to see. Together, you can make improvements to your health.”

    That philosophy is behind ARTIS Ventures’ three rounds of financing for Practice Fusion, which manages electronic health records in the cloud for more than 112,000 healthcare professionals. So far, it has raised almost $160 million since it was founded in July 2005.

    Heather Clancy is the author of Data Sheet, Fortune’s daily newsletter about the business of technology.

    咨询公司Play Bigger的合伙人、Castlight公司管理团队顾问克里斯托弗•洛克希德表示，医疗成本在大多数公司的开支项目中排在前三至五位。功能强大的分析技术的兴起和社交媒体需要的透明度，正在使更多人对Castlight公司的服务产生兴趣。洛克希德表示：“虽然听起来有些老套，但这家公司可以通过做好事把事情做得更好。”

    投资公司ARTIS Ventures的联合创始人兼高级合伙人麦克•哈登表示，医疗保健服务提供商也渴望得到这些数据，帮助他们为患者做出更明智的决定。上周，笔者与哈登就可穿戴技术在公司健康计划中的作用进行了交流，他当时提出了上述观点。他表示：“要使这些信息产生价值，就必须将它们与专业人士联系在一起。这些信息需要与你的营养师或医生可能看到的数据相关联。多方合作一定会改善你的健康。”

    ARTIS Ventures参与Practice Fusion公司的三轮融资，也正是基于这样的理念。Practice Fusion公司通过云技术，为超过112,000名医护专业人员管理电子病历。公司从2005年7月成立至今，已经获得融资约1.6亿美元。

    希瑟•克兰西是《财富》科技公司每日资讯栏目Data Sheet的作者。（财富中文网）

    翻译：刘进龙/汪皓