The Digest for Health Transformers & Changemakers
Bob Kocher has backed some of healthcare's most important companies, including StartUp Health community members Devoted Health and Virta Health, and he reads every founder email he gets. In this Fireside Chat with Unity Stoakes, the Venrock partner and physician explains why AI will improve healthcare without making it cheaper, what separates an investable company from a feature that disappears, and the first question he asks every founder before anything else. This is part of the conversation. StartUp Health members got the full Q&A and a seat to ask Bob their own questions.
🔥 Read, Watch, or Listen to the Fireside Chat Excerpt
From Devoted Health's Ed & Todd Park and Norwest's Lisa Wu to dinner salons and AI demo days, we have exciting events happening inside the community in the months ahead. Join the next live conversation and bring your own questions to the table.
Congratulations!
Recognized across caregiving, women's health, mental health, cardiometabolic care, and civic health, more than a dozen StartUp Health members have been selected as quarterfinalists in the Digital Health & AI Awards. Taken together, these Health Transformers touch nearly every health moonshot we champion and are showing how earlier, more connected care is being built.
A $500M commitment to launch Ortet, a frontier AI lab for health, tops a week with seven nine-figure deals across patient-centered foundation models, AI operations automation, AI drug discovery, clinical search, brain-computer interfaces, pharmacy benefits, and biological AI. Beyond the mega-deals, investors backed microbiome testing, cardiac imaging AI, surgical training, post-acute care automation, midwife-led maternal care, and NHS primary care tools across the US, UK, France, Israel, Portugal, Japan, Australia, and India.
📈 Read the Full Round-up
Get to know serial entrepreneur Danguole Altman, the CEO of Cx Precision Medicine, a leader in transforming geriatric medicine through biomarker-based diagnostics. The company's NeuroFirst Memory test brings earlier detection of neurodegenerative conditions like Alzheimer's and Parkinson's into primary care, closing the gap between first symptom and diagnosis. In our spotlight interview, Danguole shares her entrepreneurial journey, how her Lithuanian heritage has shaped her values, and how she navigates balancing her career with family life.
📖 Read the Q&A
🧠 Join the Alzheimer’s & Brain Health Moonshot Community
With more than 2,500 videos, 11,000+ subscribers, and nearly a million views on YouTube, our video channel spotlights Health Transformers in action, showcasing how the right mindset, moonshot vision, and the spirit of an entrepreneur make anything possible. Recent videos feature updates from Journey, UnaliWear, Mediktor, Dentistry.One, Aidar Health, Avo, Pelago, and many more.
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Yair Saperstein, MD, MHP, CEO & Co-founder of Avo, on being selected for Becker’s 2026 Rising Star List of Healthcare Leaders Under 40.
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Deanna Harshbarger, CEO of Cala Health, on being named to the inaugural Medtech Innovation Board from Medical Design & Outsourcing.
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Ed Park and Todd Park, Co-founders of Devoted Health, on raising $1.2B as the company revs up growth.
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Chris Turner, CEO & Co-founder of HealthBook+, on the company’s partnership with RxProtect to deliver medication savings and personalized care.
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Asif Khan and Laura McKee, Co-founders of Hucu.ai, on the company winning the Gold Award in the Building Bridges category of the McKnight's Technology Awards, alongside MD for Seniors.
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Luca Emili, CEO & Co-founder of InSilicoTrials, on the company joining an ARPA-H CIRCLE team to build a regulatory-ready platform for critical illness digital twins.
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Brian Russon, CEO, and Didier Perez, President of PhenoBiome, on the results from the company’s MAPLE clinical trial, showing PhenoBiome prebiotic raises gut microbial diversity, as measured on Perseus Biomics’ DynaMAP platform.
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Brandi Harless and Natalie Davis, MD, Co-founders of PreventScripts, on the company being selected as finalists in the Season Four Techquity for Health Case Study Awards.
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