Honor

Market position

Honor describes itself as the world's largest senior care network and technology platform, and after acquiring Home Instead as the largest in-home senior care network in the western hemisphere and the largest player in the home care industry. Market sizing cited in company and press materials ranges from an $83 billion worldwide home care market spread across 21,000 U.S. agencies, roughly $50 billion in the U.S., to a projected $500 billion home care industry.

The company contrasts its data-driven operations with a sector it characterizes as managed by intuition and anecdote, lacking transparency for clients, predictable hours for caregivers and staffing visibility for agencies. Employing caregivers with benefits and equity, above-average hourly pay, centralized operations, and combining technology with the relationship-based Home Instead network are presented as distinguishing features.

Technology

A proprietary care platform that extracts insights from operational data to match caregivers with clients on personalized factors and to support caregiver recruiting, training, scheduling and performance analysis, replacing paper visit records and manual scheduling. Early consumer-facing technology included the Honor Frame in-home request device and a family mobile app for monitoring visits. The company describes ongoing AI-related work applied to senior care.

Go-to-market

Honor initially expanded market by market in the United States, reaching eight states before the Home Instead acquisition, then gained nationwide and international reach via the Home Instead franchise network. It also distributes its platform to third-party home care agencies and recruits Care Pros directly, initially differentiating on pay of $15 per hour versus an industry average cited at $9.50.

Aging adults who want to remain in their own homes and need help with activities of daily living, together with the family members who arrange and monitor that care; home care agencies and Home Instead franchisees are also customers of Honor's platform.

Geography

Headquartered in San Francisco, California. Honor launched in Contra Costa County, California, and had expanded into eight U.S. states before acquiring Home Instead, which operates in the United States and 12 other countries, including a United Kingdom business led by a managing director.

History

Honor was founded in 2014 and launched its service in 2015, starting in Contra Costa County, California, with plans to expand across the San Francisco Bay Area; it was named a "best startup of the year" at TechCrunch Disrupt shortly after launch. The initial product included the Honor Frame, an in-home device allowing a senior or family member to request a caregiver for as little as one hour per week, plus a smartphone app for families to monitor caregiver time and activities and give feedback. In 2016 the company converted its caregivers from contractors to employees with benefits and equity, aiming to reduce turnover and improve continuity of care. In 2017 it began selling its operating system to other home care agencies, which marketed themselves as "powered by Honor." Prior to the Home Instead deal, Honor operated in select markets across eight states. In August 2021 it acquired Home Instead, and in October 2021 announced $70 million in Series E equity plus $300 million in debt financing.

Risks & controversies

Commentary on the sector notes that building a caregiver workforce differs from other hiring because seniors living alone are especially vulnerable to elder abuse, and that agency-standard safeguards — state licensure, criminal background checks, ongoing training, payroll tax compliance, workers' compensation, professional liability and fidelity bonding, and active supervision through a plan of care — are essential. Questions were also raised in early coverage about seniors' comfort using software to request care. Honor took on substantial debt in 2021, which management described as cheaper than equity given its performance and scale.