在展望2025年銷售突破500億美元里程碑之際，百思買下注老年人將成為其增長的主要引擎。

百思買這家零售商，多年來主要以售賣消費電子產品而聞名，比如電視機、攝像機和電腦。如今它的目光已經投向體量巨大、價值達3.5萬億美元的醫(yī)療保健市場，視之為下一個主要營收來源。

具體來說，在美國，65歲及以上的人口在未來數十年將翻倍，他們中的許多人即便有慢性病，也希望待在自己家中，正是這讓百思買的首席執(zhí)行官科莉·巴里看到了巨大潛力，這家位于明尼蘇達州里奇菲爾德的公司將把業(yè)務多元化。

“我們關注的是一個正在以難以想象的速度老去的人群，數量龐大。”在9月下旬的百思買的投資者日之前，巴里告訴記者說，“人們期望在自己家中老去。”而巴里認為，這正是百思買可以發(fā)揮自己優(yōu)勢之處，因為百思買作為零售商無數次地到訪各個家庭安裝科技設備，從家庭影院到智能家居產品。

巴里在她的前任休伯特·喬利的領導下，對百思買近年來的驚人轉型起到了關鍵的設計作用。她告訴華爾街的分析師們，她想讓人們把百思買當作“每戶家庭的首席科技官”，解決家庭的各種科技問題，比如WiFi故障，或者在老人很久沒有打開冰箱，因而進食不足時，發(fā)送警告。

在巴里設計的將百思買從當前的430億美元銷售提升至2025年的500億美元的藍圖中，抓住醫(yī)療保健行業(yè)的可觀市場份額是其中的基石。9月25日在紐約證券交易所，巴里公布了她的計劃，這是她自從今年6月執(zhí)掌公司以來首次面對華爾街講演。

最近摩根士丹利的一份報告，支持了巴里在這一行業(yè)的雄心：預計醫(yī)療保健產品和服務，將在未來給百思買的營收帶來數十億，甚至數百億美元。

去年為了支撐其醫(yī)療雄心，百思買花費10億美元用于收購，其中大頭是收購GreatCall，這是一家為老年人服務的緊急響應系統(tǒng)提供商，服務100萬人，去年的營收達3億美元。

巴里稱，她希望百思買能夠在五年內為500萬老年人提供健康監(jiān)測服務。百思買最近還收購了Critical Signal Technologies，該公司提供個人緊急響應系統(tǒng)。

百思買健康事業(yè)部的總裁阿詩什·薩克塞納，此前曾經領導公司的戰(zhàn)略發(fā)展辦公室，今年1月開始了健康事業(yè)部的新職位。他說，公司現在擁有可以更好地提供健康服務的資源，包括針對性的戶內健康保健知識，和預測性的算法。

當然，要達到500億美元的銷售額，百思買也必須擴展其傳統(tǒng)的圍繞消費電子產品的零售業(yè)務，巴里在講演中堅稱，這塊業(yè)務比人們想象的“更加堅固”。

要增強的還包括服務，比如百思買的完全科技支持項目（Total Tech Support），會員每年支付200美元即可獲得無限制的科技支持。百思買的高管稱，這一項目從1月的100萬會員至現在已經增加到200萬會員。這一服務還包括600名接打家庭電話的銷售人員。公司稱，這一服務的會員會在百思買消費地更多，多7%。

在最新的《財富》最具影響力的商界女性排名中，巴里排名第18位。她表達了她的信心，百思買已經或正在開發(fā)一些基于近些年增長的工具，可以復興一家零售商，而許多人認為零售業(yè)在7年前就該完蛋了。

“戰(zhàn)略是正確的。”她告訴記者，“我們感覺定位正確，正在去向合適的領域。”（財富中文網）

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譯者：宣峰

Best Buy is betting on senior citizens to be a major engine of growth as it looks to hit the $50 billion sales milestone in 2025.

The retailer, known for years primarily as a place to buy consumer electronics like televisions, cameras and computers, has trained its eyes on the massive $3.5 trillion health care market as its next big source of revenue.

More specifically, with the U.S. population of people 65 and older set to double in the coming decades, and on the premise that most people, even those with chronic conditions, will want to continue to live in their own homes, Best Buy CEO Corie Barry sees enormous potential for the Richfield, Minnesota-based company to diversify its business.

“We’re looking at a population that is aging incredibly rapidly. It’s massive,” Barry told reporters at late September ahead of Best Buy’s investor day. “People expect to age in their own homes.” And that, she argued, played to Best Buy’s strength given how many homes the retailer visits to install technology, from home theaters to smart home products.

Barry, a key architect of Best Buy’s stunning turnaround in recent years under her predecessor Hubert Joly, told Wall Street analysts she wants people to think of the company as “the chief technology officer for your home” for everything from troubleshooting a faulty home WiFi system to sending alerts if, say, a senior hasn’t opened the refrigerator in some time, and therefore eating sufficiently.

Grabbing a sizable share of the healthcare technology industry is a cornerstone of her roadmap to get Best Buy from about $43 billion in sales now to $50 billion in 2025, a plan she unveiled on September 25 at the New York Stock Exchange in her first presentation to Wall Street since taking the reins in June.

A recent Morgan Stanley report supports Barry’s bullishness on the sector: the firm estimates health care products and services could add billions, perhaps even tens of billions of dollars, to Best Buy’s revenues over time.

In the last year, to support the health side of those ambitions, Best Buy has spent $1 billion on acquisitions, the bulk of that on GreatCall, a seller of emergency-response systems for the elderly that serves 1 million people and last year garnered $300 million in revenue.

Barry said Best Buy hopes to be providing health monitoring services to 5 million seniors within five years. It also recently acquired Critical Signal Technologies, which provides personal emergency response systems.

Best Buy Health president Asheesh Saksena, who had previously headed the company’s strategic growth office and started in his role in January, said that the company now has resources to better serve healthcare customers, including healthcare specific in-house expertise and predictive algorithms.

Still, getting to $50 billion will also require Best Buy to expand its traditional retail business centered on consumer electronics, an industry Barry defended in her remarks as “more stable” than people think.

Moves to bolster that include services such as its Total Tech Support program, where a membership costs $200 a year for unlimited tech support. Best Buy executives said the program has 2 million members now, up from 1 million in January. The service includes 600 salespeople who make house calls. Customers of the service spent 7% more at Best Buy, the company said.

Barry, who was ranked No. 18 on Fortune’s new Most Powerful Women in business list, expressed confidence that Best Buy has or is developing the tools to build on the growth in recent years that revived a retailer many thought was doomed only seven years ago.

“The strategy is the right one,” she told reporters. “We feel like we’re directionally headed in the right space.”