Leslie Schrock

Some VC investors believe that brick and mortar - referring to a physical presence of some kind - should be avoided at all costs. Yet, the track record of clinic and hybrid care businesses in health care indicates otherwise. ==> One Medical (sold for $3.9 billion to Amazon), Oak Street (bought by CVS for $10.6 billion), Lifestance (IPO at $7.5 billion market cap), and PE-backed Premise Health (acquired by OMERS Private Equity for $1.1 billion) If a clinic is indicated as the optimal way to deliver care for that patient population, there are creative ways to build and operate them. Full article below with advice and strategies on how to build and operate hybrid clinics from my teammate Anarghya Vardhana from Maveron, Amir Dan Rubin from OneMedical Group, Steven Eidelman from Modern Animal and more!

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The (Healthcare) Ground Beneath Our Feet… This year it is likely that over $10 billion will be invested in the digital health sector – a robust amount, no doubt, but inconsequential when compared to the amount of capital tied up in healthcare real estate assets, which is estimated to be $1.2 trillion by Jones Lang Lasalle. Of that amount, approximately $790 billion is in the hospital sector while the remaining $490 billion is in medical office assets. It is estimated that there are 48.6k facilities with 3.4 billion square feet of healthcare real estate, 42% of which are owned by REITs and another 33% held by other private investment vehicles. Much of the digital health investment is meant to make the physical healthcare infrastructure more productive: greater operating efficiencies, greater patient throughput, more relevant personalized care models with better outcomes. As the healthcare system is being pushed to be more distributed to lower cost sites of care, accelerated now by the rapid proliferation of automation and AI capabilities, the potential impact on healthcare infrastructure assets will be profound. Thoughts on what that might look like... https://lnkd.in/eTfAdUbS #digitalhealth Flare Capital Partners

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Read how StoryMD is transforming patient engagement by changing the way patients view their health data, empowering them to understand, engage, and take control.

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Today, Two Chairs announces $72M of new funding to continue building a world where everyone has access to exceptional mental health care. Since late 2017, when Maveron led the Two Chairs Series A, the need for mental health services has grown considerably as our society has become lonelier and more isolated than ever. At the same time, our culture’s willingness to openly acknowledge these challenges is greater than ever. Sadly, the rapid growth of Two Chairs affirms the fact that our society is in desperate need of better mental health support. Two Chairs has built a business that believes clinical quality is the defining characteristic of success. Alex Katz has always emphasized the paramountcy of measurement-based clinical outcomes, which the team works tirelessly to achieve. In the process, Two Chairs has illustrated that embracing the ‘move fast and break things’ mentality doesn’t always work. Instead, Two Chairs opted for a different approach: they went slow to go fast. They built a proprietary algorithm that matches patients with the perfect therapist at the onset and hired a team of W2 clinicians oriented toward providing the highest quality care available. Even as the Two Chairs team has grown, their culture has remained small. This has enabled more intimate relationships within the team and between clients and clinicians. Reflecting on this milestone brings me back to the founding of Maveron and the values we hold dear. In 1998, my friend Howard Schultz and I founded Maveron to help entrepreneurs build companies that improve the lives of everyday people—their employees and their customers. There is perhaps no better example of this than Two Chairs. *** Thank you to TechCrunch's Marina Temkin, CFA for the great write-up. https://tcrn.ch/4aMt7yG

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Here is the hard truth about building a health product: skipping early feedback from healthcare insiders and payers can cost you YEARs of time and MILLIONS of $$$. At MDisrupt we are seeing a powerful shift. More and more companies are finally prioritizing feedback from real healthcare stakeholders - a critical step in the rush to scale. This isn't a nice to have, its the difference between products that SCALE and products that FAIL. So what are we doing about it? Today we are helping clients to: 👉🏼 Get feedback from PAYERS early on, crafting a reimbursement strategy that sets the stage for growth. 👉🏼 Consult CLINICIANS ensure products align seamlessly with clinical workflows — no more “great product, but hard to use” feedback. 👉🏼 Engage HEALTH SYSTEM LEADERS to confirm that the product addresses real, pressing clinical needs. We are making it as easy as possible to find these valuable experts and engage them in hourly calls so companies can get feedback quickly. Please talk to me if we can help you with this.

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AI has made good design more important than ever in healthcare. Why? Model performance alone doesn't guarantee clinical or financial value. A model can deliver a robust insight/output (accurate, reliable, complete, etc.), but clinician-users may struggle to use or integrate it in a real-world setting. As healthcare AI systems become compound machines, these design challenges amplify. Here are two simple examples: • AI systems that do not integrate seamlessly into EHRs, PACS, or pathology viewers may drive differential rates of utilization/adoption across sites, privileging some patients to a given algorithm without an underlying clinical rationale. • Imagine a model recommending a "next best step in care" that is not provided at a given hospital (e.g., due to lacking resources or infrastructure). Contextual and human factors can have a greater influence on whether the value of an AI intervention is realized, even when in silico model performance is compelling. There are two near-term opportunities here: 1) Healthcare AI model benchmarking should encompass "end-to-end systems," capturing nuances around system design, user experience, workflow integration, and ease of adoption. 2) It's time for AI-first design in healthcare – made possible by revisiting the unique capabilities of AI systems and their emergent behaviors to interrogate what new user experiences are possible. What are your favorite examples of AI-first design? #healthcare #ai #artificialintelligence #generativeai

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Every year at CES we see a lot of promising health tech prototypes and concepts - from noninvasive CGM’s to patches for everything - very few actually make it to market. Often, when it does, the launch product falls short from the initial promise. The reason: FDA Approval. The FDA is designed to protect public health - regulating medical devices falls under its prevue. The FDA clearance process is rigorous and complex to navigate. It a process that takes years - not months - something that the tech industry isn’t used to. A device would need to show clinical-level accuracy for measurements - with a margin of error of under 4 percent or better. Data infrastructure would need to be HIPPA compliant. FDA also requires areas such as communication protocols, cloud infrastructure, and cybersecurity to be include as a part of the filing. The workaround: Wellness Devices. Most consumer health devices focus on wellness features because they lack FDA certification. As a result, they can only display the data but lack any true medical or diagnostic application. As consumers are pushing their wearables to be health devices, it is getting more and more difficult for wearable companies to hide behind the “wellness” label as an increasing number of companies achieve FDA clearance. Which is a big reason why we wanted to invest in bringing FDA approval capabilities in-house to serve our portfolio of brands. In partnership with B-Secur, SweatWorks can now help any wearable product (and associated software functions) achieve expedited FDA certification. This is a first for a digital agency and has already led to several news devices starting on the FDA approval journey. How important do you view FDA certification for the next generation of wearables devices? Let me know below. 👇 #wearables #fda #certification #innovation #technology #data #fitness #wellness #hardware #medical #devices #CES

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HLTH continues to be a great networking event - for startups, health systems, investors and industry giants... between meetings and the exhibit floor. I do wonder how much people are getting out of the speakers/content here (or at any of the big meetings anymore). I usually am happy if I can hear 1 great nugget that changes how I think or design... This article gives some thought to the big trends.. and a few summaries from leaders who attended.

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Someone broke down the estimated costs of a $15 Sweetgreen salad. We need these cost graphics for digital health to help future founders. Especially for tech enabled cos, the greatest cost is labor. Much of the "value created" is in curation and matching, which means the gross margins are reliant on labor arbitrage. Pay someone $X, but get paid $X+Y% per visit. The challenge with healthcare is that you often have to pick one of two business models: 1. specialized, low volume, high cost, low gross margin % 2. generalized, high volume, low cost, high gross margin % I'd argue founders should focus on gross dollars over the lifetime of the customer (like Jeff Bezos said) instead of gross margin %'s, but we'll leave that for another time. The challenge is that many tech enabled digital health cos have high cost of goods sold (labor) and moderately high product, design, and engineering budgets. We must build differentiated solutions for patients, clinicians, and clients to be out incumbents, however, we're realizing that companies are ultimately valued on the discounted value of future cash flows. And the high SG&A costs at most organizations might be inbalanced to the unit economics of the business. I'm not sure the math pencils out for everyone unfortunately. But I'm just a guy on the internet, would love to hear the thoughts from those smarter than I (you!). Comment below. --- p.s. I have no idea the accuracy of the graphic and not an investor in Sweetgreen. Cheers. Credit: David Crowther

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🚀 Innovate for Impact, Not Hype Too many healthtech startups are dazzled by the latest technology trends. But real success comes from driving value-based outcomes. Here’s your roadmap: 🔍 Enhance Patient Outcomes 💰 Cut Down Healthcare Costs ⚙️ Boost Operational Efficiency Funding and contracts don’t come from flashy features—they come from proven results. Focus on what truly matters to your end users and stakeholders. 💡 Make value the core of your innovation strategy. #Healthtech #ValueBasedOutcomes #HealthcareInnovation #Efficiency #Innovation #Health

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Medical practice staff handle a large volume of calls and texts to patients for things like appointment scheduling, referral follow-ups and prescription refills. It's a time-consuming process and results in a lot of administrative overhead. I chatted w/ Alex Cohen about how his new startup Hello Patient built AI agents to automate this patient-facing communication work

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He fell in love with an AI chatbot; then built a $24M healthtech company from scratch. Now clinicians are champions of his product. (but he had 0 healthcare experience) Alex LeBrun, Nabla's CEO, shared a fascinating story with me: Years ago, he was captivated by an AI chatbot named Cybele. This "online dating" experience sparked his passion for AI. Here's how he did it with 0 prior experience and connections in healthcare: 1. Started his own clinic ↳ Invested heavily in creating a learning environment ↳ Operated in two countries to avoid cultural bias ↳ Observed real healthcare processes firsthand ↳ Gained credibility in the industry 2. Found the right partners ↳ Looked beyond conventional healthcare thinking ↳ Avoided those fixated on minor EMR improvements ↳ Built relationships with forward-thinking clinicians 3. Learned from your mistakes ↳ Acknowledged the high cost of building a clinic ↳ Used the experience to gather crucial initial data ↳ Leveraged it to build a strong clinician network 4. Focused on distribution, not just product ↳ Made the product accessible to individual doctors ↳ Let users become product champions 5. Made his product frictionless ↳ Created a simple Chrome extension ↳ Enabled instant trial without complex setup ↳ Designed for overwhelmed, time-poor doctors ↳ Prioritized ease of use over feature overload 6. Adapted the product to individual needs ↳ Recognized diverse documentation styles ↳ Allowed personalization down to user level 7. Built a community of champions ↳ Focused on delighting individual users ↳ Encouraged word-of-mouth promotion ↳ Leveraged doctors' influence in hospitals The key to disrupting healthcare as an outsider is to stay curious, adapt quickly, and solve real problems. PS: Are you an outsider with a bold idea for healthcare? Your fresh perspective might be exactly what the industry needs. Listen to the fascinating episode here: Apple Podcasts: https://hubs.la/Q02CS_300 Spotify Podcasts: https://hubs.la/Q02CTkn60 #CharmHealth #DigitalHealthDisruptors #HealthcareAI #ClinicalAI #AIInnovation #Nabla #AlexLebrun #HealthcareRevolution #Podcast #AIChampions #MedicalTechnology

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“So... Apple is entering the hearing space!” For the past two weeks, I've been flooded with messages asking how Apple's latest announcement will impact Concha Labs. Another consumer tech giant is stepping into the hearing space, but what does this really mean? With over 1.5 billion people affected by hearing loss globally, this is a massive market. Yet, like mental health, hearing loss is something people don’t talk about much. If you ask anyone who’s tried hearing aids, you’ll likely hear stories of frustration—they’re often disliked because of impersonal sound quality. For me, they were always too loud or too quiet, and I could never find the “right” fit. This isn’t new. Apple, like Bose before them, will likely face similar challenges in replicating the status quo. Despite their audio expertise, Bose entered the hearing aid space but exited due to the same hurdles. Bluetooth earpieces, with their short battery life and social awkwardness, also highlight how hard it is to create a practical, long-term solution. But here’s the good news: more attention on hearing health, thanks to Apple’s announcement and the OTC Hearing Aid Act, is a win for everyone. It’s sparking conversations about hearing loss—something I kept hidden for decades. Concha Labs' hearing aids are nearly invisible, like contact lenses. When I tell people I’m wearing our product, they’re always shocked because they don’t notice them, even with my hair up! (And this goes for the guys who wear them, too!) What’s clear to me is that while awareness is growing, real innovation comes from solving actual user pain points. That’s where Concha Labs comes in: we offer a fully personalized hearing experience, much like how Spotify revolutionized music personalization beyond iTunes. Our solution is designed for real-world usability—comfortable, discreet, personalized, and customizable in multiple sizes and colors. Created by people who were tired of the status quo (like me!), our Concha Sol hearing aids are made for those who want something better. So, if you’re tired of the same old hearing aids, let Concha Labs empower you to hear clearly. We promise, you’ll notice the difference. 😉 Amy www.conchalabs.com #hearing #hearingaids #apple #conchalabs #invisible #otchearingaids #startup

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One of my proudest moments as an investor occurred today as Alaffia Health announced its series A because it shows how the Aperture® Venture Capital vision of multi-level, multi-generational #impactinvesting is succeeding in the marketplace. Here’s the model in its most basic form : ✅As diverse fund managers with meaningful capital to allocate, we are changing the VC landscape every day just by doing our day jobs. ✅As Black/Brown investors with ~40 years experience collectively, Aperture GPs have access to talent /excellence that others do not, so our portfolio *organically* is more inclusive by race, gender and geography even while optimizing for financial outcomes (all about the alpha). ✅Our most successful portco’s are using financial #innovation to solve market problems that impact underrepresented demographics and underserved communities. Alaffia Health is a shining example of the impact portion of our overall fund thesis, and we couldn’t be prouder of TJ Ademiluyi and Adun Akanni, MPH, PMP - the dynamic brother-sister founder duo whose vision we have steadfastly supported on their journey. Congratulations to TJ and Adun from William Crowder and myself, as well as the whole Aperture team- Marjorie King Philip McKenzie Yves Louis-Jacques Tanvi Lal Michelle Dhansinghani Lisha Bell Katie Kelly Amy Chung Cindy Chong, CFA Brian Fernandes-Halloran Monroe France Jayden Pantel Darren Herman Evan Wladis Neal Triplett Thomas Scriven Peter Ammon Irina Bit-Babik Tim Milanich Rob Rahbari

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Why Isn’t Healthcare More Personalized? ask Robbie Hughes and colleagues in Harvard Business Review. What will it take to make healthcare at least as personalized as our Amazon product recommendations? The advent of the electronic health record, a single source of truth with petabytes after petabytes of data, does not drive personalization, but rather standardization – health care is delivered on a cookie-cutter based approach. Robbie headed health tech start-up company Lumeon that noted from ‘…nearly 20,000 outpatient surgery cases in one health system and found that just under 70% of the patients didn’t need one or more of the standard pre-surgical tests.’  Another study of cancer care pathways found that 65% of cancer patients were treated using one of the standard pathways and 35% were not. I get the need for smart process automation, combining standardization and personalization to create the most effective and responsive care, but how about the needs of the individual patient? We can achieve mass personalization, for sure. https://lnkd.in/e4PWcUqa

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I recently sat down with Michael Batko, CEO at Startmate and Founder of Puddle Pod for Episode 11 of Insane Ambition. Startmate has invested in 230+ startups, much of it under Michael's leadership, and now has $3.5b in value across its portfolio companies. In this episode, we discussed: - Michael's journey from consulting, then living in the Amazon rainforest, to leading Australia's biggest startup accelerator - The future of Australia's startup ecosystem - The labour government's very stupid plan to make it harder for people to qualify as sophisticated investors (now thankfully shelved) - Startmate City! Startmate's plan to build Australia's first startup city. Probably the most ambitious idea I've ever heard from a startup accelerator. - The balance between visionary thinking and traditional startup advice (think Elon Musk's plan to colonise Mars, vs Y Combinator's problem/customer obsession) - "The Courage to Be Disliked", and its influence on Michael's approach to life and business. Links in the description below 👇

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Thank you, Sumit Nagpal, for shining a light on two incredibly important movements in what can often feel like a challenging healthcare startup environment. This is a huge win for women's health and signals the dawn of a new era for consumer health. I firmly believe in moving away from a one-size-fits-all solution for men and women, and recognizing the need for a completely different approach – sometimes in obvious ways, and sometimes not. People have access to more knowledge and data about their health than ever before, enabling them to make informed decisions about their well-being. Consumer health is ripe for a comeback! #consumerhealth #digitalhealth #menshealth

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Join me Thursday, May 9 at 9amET, and Microsoft for Startups company founders, Stead Burwell, Lana Feng, Ph.D. Andrew Gostine, MD, MBA and Ankur Teredesai for a lively, *real-world* conversation about applying #AI to improve #healthcare. In addition to hearing these leading #innovators discuss the challenges, value, and future of AI, you'll learn how: 💲 Outbound AI uses AI to improve #RevenueCycleManagement 💊 Huma.AI uses #GenAI to provide meaningful and actionable #insights for #lifesciences companies 🛌Artisight uses #AI and #cognitiveservices to streamline #patientcare and #safety 😷 CueZen uses #AI and #GenAI for hyper-personalized management of #chronicconditions 👉 Registration is below. Stelios Hatzakis Tony Kountz Derek Haynes Bethany Cordes Tom Davis Ted Roduner Microsoft for Healthcare

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Today was a big win for consumer health, with Flo Health Inc.'s valuation at $1 billion. We're hearing talk about the market becoming frothy again, but I’d argue—without seeing the detailed financials—that this valuation could be entirely warranted. Flo has built an impressive business, with 5 million paid subscribers and 70 million monthly active users. At $60 per year for users to access the product, this business has hundreds of millions in revenue and plenty of room to grow. It's increasingly clear to me that innovators focused on healthcare have been wildly underestimating consumer business models for years, believing that patients would only opt for solutions covered by their health plans and prescribed or recommended by their doctors. That thesis needs updating, particularly given high deductible plans and soaring co-pays. Innovators building solutions that users genuinely love will win - even in healthcare. These businesses also have the potential to move into B2B channels, which is far easier to do when you have an engaged, loyal user base. I expect we’ll see many more consumer health businesses “pop” in the years to come, further proving that consumers are ready and willing to pay for such solutions. We're watching closely at Cherish Kudos to the team at Flo for this impressive milestone. Lainie Muller Charlotte Yeh Aashima Gupta Avanlee Christine Esther Dyson Alexandra Drane Jessica Kamada Vin Gupta, MD MPA Asheesh Saksena Paul Crnkovich Josh Kampel Steve Chazin Lee Wagner #agingwithattitude #independentliving #consumerdrivencare

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