Artificial Intelligence (AI) has the capability to mimic intelligent human behaviour, the art and science of designing systems that can reason, learn, and make decisions. Once considered a distant, futuristic vision, AI has experienced explosive growth in healthcare, a field long thought to be reserved for highly trained human experts, revolutionising diagnostics, treatment planning, and patient care.
Medvi appears to be the most recent example of this revolution. Founded in 2024 by Matthew Gallagher, the U.S. telehealth company specialises in compounded GLP-1 weight-loss medications. In its first full year of operation, Medvi scaled to hundreds of millions in revenue with just two employees, leveraging AI across nearly all functions. The company is now on track to exceed $1 billion in projected sales for 2026.
At first glance, this rapid growth appears to be a clear win of AI-driven innovation. So, what’s the issue?
What looked like seamless progress raises questions about ethical boundaries, regulatory compliance, and the reliability of metrics investors typically depend on. Medvi reportedly relied heavily on AI-generated content in its marketing, including fabricated doctor personas and manipulated before-and-after images. These campaigns often overstated benefits or created misleading impressions, which likely contributed to rapid revenue growth while drawing regulatory scrutiny.
The Role of Digital Due Diligence
At this point, Digital Due Diligence (DDD) becomes essential. While traditional due diligence focuses on financials, legal documents, and team backgrounds, DDD examines the company’s digital footprint, the very foundation of how modern startups like Medvi operate and grow.
In the case of Medvi, two key components of DDD are particularly relevant: Technology Due Diligence and Marketing Due Diligence.
Technology Due Diligence
Medvi positioned itself as a highly efficient, AI-powered telehealth company. Given its extremely high reliance on AI, Technology Due Diligence is essential. It evaluates the company’s software, tools, digital infrastructure, and overall technological maturity. Proper Technology Due Diligence quantifies the real level of AI maturity and delivers a grounded view of the company’s actual technological edge, rather than relying on surface-level claims.
Marketing Due Diligence
While the explosive revenue growth of Medvi can impress investors, Marketing Due Diligence provides a data-driven perspective to assess whether that growth is grounded in transparent, responsible practices or risky marketing tactics. This approach assesses, among other factors, the quality, ethics, and sustainability of a company’s market execution by examining its market position, brand strength, and marketing performance. This way, red flags can be identified, even without the need for a deep financial audit.
For example, Marketing Due Diligence would also have exposed the clear inconsistencies between Medvi’s narrative of seamless AI-driven innovation and its actual marketing practices, particularly the affiliate-driven ads that blurred the line between real medical professionals and AI-created content. Beyond visible tactics, it could have flagged early signals of customer dissatisfaction, which often correlate with opaque marketing strategies.
Takeaway
The Medvi case underscores the critical importance of rigorous Digital Due Diligence in the age of AI. By thoroughly examining a company's digital footprint, including AI-generated marketing content, ad campaigns, website claims, affiliate practices, and early regulatory signals, stakeholders can uncover attempts to exploit emerging technologies before harm or legal fallout occurs.
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