Co-founder of telehealth platform Updoc Dylan Coyne says he and his business partner Clifton Hodgkinson have made a point of hiring “really smart, bright, intelligent people” and giving them a large measure of autonomy. “We empower them,” Coyne says. “They can make decisions. They can work collaboratively with others. They can really do what they enjoy and they’re passionate about it. We provide the structure and opportunities for them to connect, for feedback, for assistance, for help.”
Updoc, the winner of the 2025 Financial Review BOSS Best Place to Work in the Government, Education, Not-for-profit and Health category, was launched about four years ago. Today the company employs between 30 and 35 staff to run a platform that can connect people with AHPRA doctors (the statutory Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency) for online consultations 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
The consultations can be for general practice medical advice, or advice on weight loss, sexual health, or mental health, or new and repeat medication prescriptions (which can be sent to the patient’s phone), medical certificates, referrals to specialists, and referrals for blood, pathology, radiology and imaging tests.
Updoc now has an annual revenue of more than $10 million. As the leaders of a small and fast-growing company, employing dozens of digital workers with an average age in the early 30s, Coyne says he and Hodgkinson have a flexible employee policy in terms of work from home.
“We do have a hybrid approach,” he says. “People are probably coming into the office on average two to four days per week. But then we’re quite flexible and understand that people have other commitments, they have families, they have lifestyles outside of work, and we’re really supportive of that.
“We can even get to the stage where they may be visiting a family member in another country, and they may work temporarily in another country.”
Culturally and linguistically diverse
The main Updoc office is in inner Sydney’s Surry Hills – close to the Central railway station and light rail network.
“We find the best ideas can happen in the office,” Coyne says, adding the platform also has a small operation in the UK. “The great thing about the time zones is that when the Australian team is sleeping, the UK team can be online.”
Updoc invests heavily to recruit the best employees, Coyne says, adding that about 75 per cent of the team are culturally and linguistically diverse.
“These are people coming from different backgrounds, different cultures from all around the world,” he adds. “By hiring the smartest people, we’re getting a wide range of ideas, opinions and thoughts, and we’re providing them with an environment where they can speak up and share those ideas and thoughts freely.”
The company has standard maternity leave, but there are also family-friendly flexible employment policies to help employees cope with demands of children’s school and activity commitments. This flexibility, Coyne says, is intended to help Updoc employees “structure work around their life, as opposed to life around work”.
Updoc also has a weekly “Sharing Day”, which has led to a 400 per cent increase in weekly experiments across teams, a 300 per cent increase in requests to work in additional roles to understand new processes for development, and 100 per cent retention of employees.
Feedback from all-company assessments, Updoc says, indicates employees feel supported and willing to contribute openly without fear of judgment or backlash.
Before Updoc, Coyne, not quite 30 and Hodgkinson, 31, had an e-bike rental company, Jot Bikes. They switched to telehealth after Coyne fell off one of the e-bikes, broke his arm and found the logistical difficulties of his subsequent healthcare onerous and time-consuming.
He had to see a doctor, get a referral for an X-ray, book the X-ray, see the doctor again, get follow-up tests – he estimates that sorting out his broken arm took about 15 appointments.
“Each time I had to take time off work and really structure my day around that; I thought there’s got to be a better way to make healthcare more accessible and convenient,” he says. A comprehensive telehealth platform was the answer.
Billing itself as a pioneer in the “future of healthcare”, Updoc can connect patients with hundreds of doctors across Australia (most working as third parties), providing people with easy and convenient healthcare and the consulting doctors with an earning opportunity, Coyne says.
Follow-up
Patients can request a single consultation via a questionnaire that is reviewed by one of Updoc’s partner doctors. The doctor asks follow-up questions via text message to determine how best to proceed. A patient’s request is usually answered by a doctor within an hour, according to Updoc’s website.
Patients who have ongoing health problems can also pay a monthly subscription fee for an unlimited number of medical consultations.
The platform caters for people who cannot easily visit a GP, from the mother who is up in the middle of the night with a distressed baby to someone who lives in the remote outback whose nearest doctor is out of reach, Coyne says.
It caters for busy professionals who find it difficult to carve time out of their day to physically visit a GP and for people who cannot leave their homes for whatever reason.
Updoc also has a marketing team “we’re very proud of” to generate publicity about the platform, Coyne says.
“They come up with different ways to get the word out there and tell people, hey, in fact you can see a doctor online, whereas many people may not think that’s possible and that’s available to them.”