Employers can no longer afford to overlook the trend of personalized benefits in the multi-generational workforce. (Photo: Shutterstock)

Employee benefits technology and tools encompass a wide variety of areas, from benefits administration to investment funds, smoking cessation, financial wellness, HR management, and more. Here's the latest product news:

The EX Program, a digital quit-smoking and vaping program for employers from Truth Initiative announced the expansion of its quit-smoking resources through a partnership with wellness technology and services provider Wellable. Wellable integrates directly with all leading consumer wellness apps and wearable devices, giving users access to mobile one-on-one coaching with tobacco treatment specialists, peer support from thousands of smokers and ex-smokers in an active online community, and a customized quit plan, including quit medication delivered directly to participants' homes.

Trilogy Integrated Resources has launched the Florida Network of Care for Behavioral Health portal to provide comprehensive resources to Florida families who are struggling with mental health and substance use issues. The web-based portal includes a database of local programs and services, quick access to local emergency and crisis intervention programs, as well as a library of more than 30,000 articles, fact sheets and interactive tools. It's part of the national Network of Care that has more than 700 customized, community-based websites in 30 states.

Principal Financial Group announced its voice-activated financial wellness and retirement readiness education. When individuals enable the Principal Flash Briefing skill and say, “hey Alexa, what's my Flash Briefing?” they'll hear quick retirement planning and financial tips spoken to them. Listeners will be directed to  Principal.com/Alexa to dive deeper on the topic with resources from their financial wellness platform, Principal Milestones.

Pacific Life Insurance Company announced two new indexed universal life insurance products: Pacific Discovery Xelerator IUL 2 (PDX IUL 2) and Pacific Indexed Accumulator 6 (PIA 6).1 PDX IUL 2 emphasizes long-term cash value potential. PIA 6 focuses on higher cash surrender values in the policy's early years.In addition to three new Performance Factor rider designs, the new products offer 15 other riders.

Medica introduced three new programs that provide personalized support for health-related challenges: ConsumerMedical—for health care decision support; Omada Health—to help members at risk for diabetes and heart disease build health habits, lose weight and reduce their disease risk; and Wellthy—offering help to families caring for aging, chronically ill or disabled loved ones. The programs are available to self-insured group customers. Medica operates in Minnesota, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota and Wisconsin.

Hand Benefits & Trust (HB&T), a BPAS company announced the launch of a new collective investment fund in collaboration with Jensen Investment Management. The Jensen Quality Growth Collective Investment Fund seeks to provide qualified institutional investors with the firm's flagship Quality Growth Strategy with the lower shareholder servicing costs associated with a CIF. The Jensen Quality Growth CIF launched on February 1, 2019, and will be accessible to eligible retirement plans through most recordkeeping platforms.

Doctor On Demand announced the launch of Synapse, a platform that aims to help health plans and employers nationwide deliver primary care coverage virtually. With Synapse, health plans and employers will be able to link their existing networks and services with Doctor On Demand providers, and customize which parts of the platform they want to integrate into their larger ecosystem. Features include Digital Medical Home: a singular patient profile that houses patient-controlled patient health information; expanded clinical capabilities such as chronic disease management and urgent care, and  Smart Referrals: which helps ensure member referrals, lab services, imaging and prescriptions stay in network.

CrowdStreet launched a streamlined, investor-friendly approach to investing qualified retirement account funds into commercial real estate offerings, partnering with custodians Entrust Group, Equity Trust and Millennium Trust Company. This new option aims to make it easier for individuals to access CRE investments with their self-directed IRAs.

ClockShark announced the release of its new paid time off software and mobile app, ClockShark PTO. ClockShark customers can build PTO or sick policies in as little as 90 seconds, and paid time accrues automatically, eliminating this task completely. Available with the Pro plan, ClockShark PTO allows employees to see their earned time and request a full or partial day off work right from the mobile app. Managers get alerted of the request and can approve or decline requests which then update automatically to the job schedule. READ MORE:

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