Dallas-Based Sentrics Uses Tech to Revolutionize Senior Living—And Has Made Five Acquisitions to Do So

Dallas-based Sentrics wants to revolutionize the future of senior living. CEO Darin LeGrange knows that technology can do more for the sector because he and his team have already made it work in healthcare.

That’s why the fast-growing company, founded in 2016, has acquired and integrated five companies into a single entity. Together, they make up an integration of technology companies that deliver data-driven solutions for senior living.

It was “no small effort,” LeGrange admits. “We’ve grown very strategically, acquired selectively, and integrated multiple technologies successfully,” the CEO told us. And unlike most of its competitors, which focuses on one segment of the market, Sentrics has expanded its breadth across multiple product segments.

The company’s sixth and most recent acquisition was announced just last week. Luna Lights, which employs trip-tracking tech to keep seniors safer, will join Sentrics’ lineup of acquisition. Already on the list is Ciscor, Silversphere, SeniorTV, Esco Technologies, and Allen Technologies.

“Acquisition is part of our makeup, and we will continue to acquire companies to help give [senior] communities that all-important 360-degree view of their residents’ needs,” LeGrange says.

Trip-tracking tech joins Sentrics’ platform

The company’s four “360” platforms—Ensure360, Entertain360, Engage360, and Enrich360—are designed to change the way a senior resident is cared for within a community through one master platform called Sentrics360.

For a single building or a sprawling campus, the platform’s services include emergency call, life safety, environmental and activity monitoring, entertainment, connectivity, and life enrichment.

Sentrics partners with senior living operators to further focus on the well-being of residents. In providing actionable physical, medical, social, and mental data, the integrated platform serves as a comprehensive and understandable view of a resident.

According to LeGrange, this drives greater outcomes across the senior living care continuum, while at the same time reducing costs.

Sentrics plans to add Luna Lights technology to its Ensure360 platform, which combines sensors, eCall, real-time location services, and personalized contact tracing.

The bed sensors trigger nighttime lighting that turns on and off with movement, LeGrange says. “It also captures valuable data about the quality of sleep that will feed the company’s Enrich360 solution and help caregivers anticipate resident needs.”

Sentric’s Enrich platform uses AI and machine learning to predict and deliver understandable outcomes so caregivers can avert an incident. A combined product will be able to notify caregivers when a resident’s behavior has changed, which can signal an underlying condition.

A company built on a mission

Sentrics was founded by Periscope Equity in 2016—under the original name Seniormetrics—with the intent to create a new platform for senior living.

“We needed to provide a 360-degree view of a resident’s physical safety, medical health, social engagement and behavioral health,” LeGrange says. “We’re more than a technology company. We’re a passionate group of people that want to make the ‘golden years’ truly special for every senior living community resident.”

It started with a single acquisition, Ciscor, as a cornerstone for life safety.

Then, in 2018, Periscope Equity and LeGrange partnered to identify missing component needed to fulfill a vision hinged on acquisitions. The goal was to develop a whole new platform that puts the resident at the center of everything.

The initial executive team was formed with the hiring of CFO David Keane and CDO Chad Harris to execute that aggressive acquisition strategy.

By early 2019, three additional acquisitions had been completed: SeniorTV, the cornerstone of Sentrics’ entertainment solutions; Silversphere, which enhanced its life safety solutions; and Allen Technologies, an acute care patient experience software tool.

The Care Connect division of Esco Technologies came in late 2019. Following that move, the name was changed to Sentrics and the Sentrics360 platform was announced.

A mission-oriented private company with 200 employees and counting, Sentrics says it’s been ranked among the top five biggest vendors in the senior living community industry for the past two years.

LeGrange credits the success to his team, which affects the fast-track changes the company has seen. It’s a testament to the culture, team, and attitude the company has as it relates to customers and the industry.

“Knowing how to lead is a learnable skill, and we ask our most promising leaders to complete a nine-month Leadership Academy, partnering with Resolved Leadership Solutions,” LeGrange says. “We also have a passionate group of team members, called Team Impact, who work across all five of our offices to develop and manage volunteer programs to help the residents inside our communities.”

One program the company is proud of was hand creating some 700 cards that were delivered to community residents across the U.S. in the pandemic to help ease some of “the isolation and loneliness of residents who were alone during the initial lockdown period.”

The COVID-19 effect

LeGrange and his team recognized early on in the pandemic that the senior living industry would be profoundly impacted. He had to make several decisions quickly to prepare for the worst, while hoping for the best. And he was right—Sentrics’ solutions were declared an essential service early on.

Overall, he just wanted to ensure that Sentrics was able to deliver more for the community faster.

That meant making the Ensure360 solution available. Recently, Sentrics began delivering automated contact tracing and case management capabilities with Ensure360 to help communities identify those at risk, manage infection cases, and easily prevent the spread of any contagious condition.

Those abilities are because LeGrange and his team had the foresight to include RTLS technology and an integrated rules engine in the technology.

“We also responded quickly to offer complimentary services to communities struggling to keep residents busy during those lockdowns,” LeGrange says. “Free senior-safe exercises, access to support music and the ability to instantly communicate with residents and family members were available in the early days of the pandemic.”

Sentrics’ team is currently fully functional in a remote environment, and the company has pivoted to a flexible, voluntary return to the office program.

But, because there are team members who need to visit senior living communities to help install and support critical systems, a diligent focus on safety remains.

“While communities open, they continue to plan for the future. They know they can’t go back to the way it was,” LeGrange says. “They can’t rely solely on group activities to engage residents with purpose. They need more automation to help caregivers be more efficient and to anticipate resident needs.”

A growing assisted living market

While all sectors of senior living communities (including independent living, skilled nursing, and memory care) will continue to grow, LeGrange says, “we’ll see the biggest growth within assisted living communities, which number about 29,000 with nearly 1-million licensed beds,”

Baby boomers will age into communities “with higher expectations and higher life expectancies,” which means “communities will need to change their models to remain not just competitive, but viable.”

Sentrics’ solutions are designed to make that transition easier, according to LeGrange.

One significant advantage to the Sentrics platform is that communities don’t have to adopt all technologies at once.

For example, communities could modernize their life safety technology and leverage the automated contact tracing and case management capabilities by starting with the Ensure360 platform. Or, they could expand their TV programming for more entertainment options or their internet capabilities to eliminate the frustrating buffering.

“Healthcare and senior living will continue to converge, and successful senior living communities will adopt full clinical care models to manage episodic and chronic conditions,” LeGrange says. “This is only accomplished through the effective use of technology to drive every facet of the resident experience.”

The CEO sees the company’s success as being “defined by a recognition of the end consumer—or resident—that they are choosing a community because it is a Sentrics-driven community.

“We want to have that kind of impact on lives.”

Alex Edwards and Quincy Preston contributed to this report.